How much do strip dancers make
Here's How Much Strippers Actually Make
- The amount of money a stripper makes on any given night is unpredictable and influenced by factors ranging from the weather and the economy to a dancer's mood and costume.
- One dancer who was working on New Year's Eve received $500 for talking to a man about neuroscience for 20 minutes.
- Another dancer said it's possible for strippers to lose money in a night if they can't cover their tip out and house fee.
The number one thing that dancers like about stripping is the money. Most women expressed that, at least in the beginning, to be given rolls of cash for making conversation, drinking freely, and giving the occasional private dance was very exciting.
For many dancers, like Laura, who is 19 years old, money made from stripping also allowed them much needed financial security, and the means to provide some luxuries for their children. Laura said:
I have a little boy and I’m married. It's helped our life a lot because financially speaking — I moved out when I was 16, had my little boy at 15. Financially, I was making $7.25-an-hour and things were hard. Whereas now, in two weeks I'm doing a big haunted house for all the kids in the neighborhood. I've put thousands of dollars into it just for the kids, and we're still okay. So we’re able to relax a little more. Things aren’t as stressful outside of here. Birthday parties, Christmas, wanting to just go to the zoo, or do something — that's a possibility now, and it's really not that hard for me to achieve because our work is so flexible and we can work as much as we want. So I can just work an extra night and these things are possible.
Some of the women I interviewed also shared stories of men who gave them a large sum of money without expecting any sexual favors in exchange.
These experiences are important to dancers not only because it is gratifying to receive a gift of money but also because they reaffirm the woman's belief in the generosity of some clients.
Dana's story is typical of these lucrative encounters with clients:
I had a really good customer come in, a younger guy, and I totally didn't trust him either. He always wanted to go out, and I thought he was married. I still wonder to this day if he was married. But he came in, and on my birthday last year he brought in seven or eight hundred dollars: here you go, no strings attached, no anything. I thought that was really neat. Most of them are just like that, people just being nice. An older guy — he was a car dealer — he came in around Christmas time, and I sat with him for a little bit, and he asked me what I bought for my daughter. And I said I hadn’t bought her anything yet. I wasn't able to. And he said, "You need to get that baby something, here," and he slaps two hundred dollars on the table. "Tell her this is from me." And I had just met the guy. So it’s just people who do nice things out of the blue, out the ordinary. I know it’s money things, but it's just the thought that went behind it giving you the money.
Recently single, and working on New Year's Eve, April was feeling a little blue until she danced for a generous customer:
I was single and I was kind of depressed. He comes in and we go up to the VIP room. We’re up there twenty minutes, and he has to leave because he’s having a New Year’s Eve party, and he gives me $500. So that was pretty cool. That doesn’t happen as much as people think—20 minutes of work—$500. And I didn’t do anything. I was a neurology major at the time, and we were talking about the structure of the brain while I was dancing for him, and it was really weird.
It was actually the least sexual dance I’d ever done. We were sitting there talking about serotonin levels and dopamine levels and neurons and the limbic system, the temporal lobe, the parietal lobe, all this stuff. I’m sitting here dancing for him, and he just gives me $500 and leaves.
Like Dana, April appreciated that this customer recognized her as a person and, in her case, as an intelligent woman, in addition to giving her a large gift of cash.
The desire for money, the need for money, and the impact of money on dancers' lives cannot be overestimated. But, as April’s reflections indicate, the meaning of money for dancers goes beyond its purchasing power. It may signify, as it did for Dana, that a customer appreciates and can empathize with her struggles.
At the same time, the amount of money a woman makes on any given night is unpredictable, and influenced by uncontrollable factors like the weather, the economy, the time of the month, and the number of other performers working, as well as elements under a dancer’s control, like her mood and costume.
Beverly, who is 24 years old, has made as much as $500 and as little as $3 in a shift. Beverly also described nail-bitingly stressful days when she made no money at all for four hours and then, at the very end of the night (1:30 a.m.) collected $250 from last-minute table dances.
Stacy, who is 32 years old, wonders how girls working day shifts even survive. She said, "I’ve seen day shifts where we've had one guy come in here and buy one dance." It’s particularly distressing for a dancer to leave work owing money if she does not earn enough to cover tip-out and her house fee.
Jenny Cheng/INSIDERSTRIPPED is an INSIDER series featuring adapted excerpts from the book "Stripped: More Stories from Exotic Dancers" by Bernadette Barton.
Bernadette Barton is an author and Professor of Sociology and Gender Studies at Morehead State University. To read more from "Stripped: More Stories from Exotic Dancers" you can purchase the book here.
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How Much Do Strippers Make (What It Really Looks Like)
Climbing The Ladder
By Sayoni Nyakoon | Wednesday, April 05, 2017
Why become a stripper? An easy answer is: Money.
You see, when I turned 18, I became financially stable. I had earned acceptance into City Year, packed my belongings, and moved to Denver. I worked 60 hours a week, and saved most of what I earned. At age 19, I started my undergrad at the University of Colorado, and found it difficult to balance working even just twelve hours a week and maintain decent grades. Then, I turned 20, and was offered an unpaid internship with the Colorado Department of Education.
I realized that if I accepted the offer, I would risk my financial security and independence. Later that summer, I became a stripper.
To put all the clichés and myths to rest, to let you hear it from the horse’s mouth — or the stripper’s tax return — let’s throw numbers around about what a stripper salary looks like.
I would earn $76,800 dollars a year — before taxes — if I worked for six hours a day, four days out of the week, and averaged $400 each night.
The truth about stripping is an average of $400 per night is an acceptable number for many exotic dancers. Not good, not bad — acceptable. A four day per week, six-hour shift is the standard: acceptable, if draining. There are some exotic dancers who would never return to a club if they could not make at least $500 per four-hour shift. There are also some exotic dancers who would beg for an opportunity to make $300 per eight-hour shift.
Strippers take pride in how much money can you earn from stripping. A large sum of money can turn what many would consider an immoral and degrading profession into a practical one.
The almighty dollar breaks down stigma and taboo — for some unfortunate souls, it defines their self-worth. Hence, why a dancer would quit after one bad (i.e., <$400.00) night. Yes, an exotic dancer would expect to make more money in Manhattan — where a studio apartment often costs $2,000, if not much more — than in Denver, where you can find a one-bedroom in a high-rise for $900. But when you live in a city like Denver, and you threaten to quit over a few low nights, you have to ask yourself, exactly what are you trying to prove? And to whom?
The same questioned applies to what exotic dancers/strippers/ecdysiasts choose to call themselves. The word “stripper” is considered dirty, titillating, or uncouth. While I prefer to call a spade a spade, I have met strippers who are genuinely offended to be placed in the same category as the low-paid, classless, and deeply stupid characters that parade around in pasties on television screens, who need saving in big-budget movies. I am not a stripper, they protest, I am an entertainer.
An Exotic Dancer.
And yet…Go-Go dancers are technically exotic dancers, but they DO NOT strip (ask them). And I must admit — not all strippers dance. So what’s a…person who dances and takes off her clothes to do? Besides admitting that the words basically mean the same thing, and it is just connotations that vary. However, while I personally could not give a single fuck about someone who finds my profession uncouth simply based on its name, I would hate to unintentionally titillate someone as an alternative. And I pride myself on being straightforward. Therefore, I refer to myself and others in my profession as ecdysiasts, i.e., striptease artists. You can thank Gypsy Rose Lee for getting H. L. Mencken to come up with the term. Gypsy Rose Lee considered herself a “high class stripper,” and while I can write and say and act like I don’t care about what people think of my profession, I like having a term for what I do that winks at my intelligence.
Exotic dancing does not require any sort of formal education.
Most clubs allow you to dance once you reach 18. The flexibility given to ecdysiasts is one I have never encountered in another industry. Generally, you can work as little or as much as you want — as long as you are a good ecdysiast and always, always, always make the club money. You see, ecdysiasts are independent contractors. They pay “rent” to dance in a club, fees to use [private/VIP/champagne] rooms, and “tips” for the DJ, dressing room manager (house mom), bouncers, hair professional, makeup professional, hosts, and (occasionally) the bus boys.
How much does it cost to make a fantasy come to life? Again, this varies by state, city, borough, and neighborhood. Some clubs require an ankle-length gown ($100.00), and others don’t mind cheap lingerie (~$50.00). Heels that are at least four inches high and hair that reaches your shoulders (at least) are cheap in comparison. The ecdysiast herself gets to decide how much to spend on makeup, accessories, and everything else that makes her prepared to confidently tell a stranger, “The private room is 500 dollars per half hour.
”
When you’re an ecdysiast, you walk into work saying a prayer. Either you leave the club a few hours later with $2,000, or you stay the entire night and leave with less money than you entered. This is true whether you do or don’t include the cost of upkeep an ecdysiast must spend to maintain herself and the illusion she sells. It is entirely possible to work an entire week and come out in the negative.
In my three and a half years as an ecdysiast — not necessarily brief, when you consider most ecdysiasts quit after five years — I’ve seldom returned home in the negative. On the contrary, I’ve been able to firmly cement my own financial security, financially assist friends and relatives, and go on vacations. Lots and lots of vacations.
I don’t write this piece to glorify or demonize stripping as a profession. However, there is plenty of misinformation regarding sex work, and I intend to clear the air. Exotic dancing is a side hustle that some turn into a career. It is a way to make money.
Sayoni is a Kentucky born, Philadelphia raised, Colorado educated, wannabe novelist and MFA candidate living in New York City. She is especially fond of Japanese food.
Image via Pexels
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90,000 Stripper wages in America.
Salary and tips 11/12/2021
There are a lot of clubs in the USA where strippers dance. This is not the highest paid profession in the state, but some girls earn very well. It should be understood that the country has a very well established tax collection system. This process has been worked out almost to the ideal, so not a single stripper in an interview admits how much she actually receives. Information about the official salary, of course, is available, but information about tips, which can form a significant proportion of the funds received for a shift, is rather vague.
How to become a stripper
There are no specialized educational institutions where you can get a profession of a stripper in the USA. Pretty young girls aged 18-25 have a high chance of getting a place as a stripper in one of the country's clubs. Naturally, any employer evaluates a candidate according to the following criteria:
- external data (figure, beauty, etc.), which must be at the level;
- ability to dance and move beautifully;
- knowledge of elementary acrobatic numbers is an additional plus;
- sociability and emancipation in communication.
The ability to attract not only by appearance, but also by other advantages is only welcome. However, one must understand that respectable striptease clubs are not a brothel, therefore, it is impossible to cross the line of decency when applying for a job. By the way, you can find a place for a stripper by an ad on specialized sites, but there are practically no worthy vacancies. It is much more efficient to search through friends or on your own - just by visiting strip clubs and offering your services.
The average salary of a stripper
The range of the official average salary of a stripper in the US is quite large. It is 20-40 dollars per hour (43,000-68,000 per year). The median level is $50,000 per year. However, some girls with experience working in elite strip clubs can receive up to $100 an hour, and their annual earnings are comparable to those of representatives of prestigious professions. Tips should be mentioned separately, as sometimes they make up the bulk of the money earned.
An experienced stripper who worked in Atlanta reported that she was paid $34-$50 per shift (6 hours). However, sometimes I had to work 2 shifts in a row. In this case, the hourly rate doubled. In this club, the main income of the girls was tips - at least $ 400 per shift. There were days/nights when the stripper went home with $1,500 in her pocket. At the same time, the rules of the institution provided that 10% of the tip amount had to be paid to the club's cash desk.
Average earnings of strippers in expensive states and cities
In fact, the difference in earnings of strippers in cheap and expensive states may not be significant, since to a greater extent it depends on the place of work, traffic in the club and the experience of the girls. However, there is a difference. Below is information about the average salary range in some of the most expensive cities and states in the country (October 2021).
Official salary without tips
| $68,415 |
In these and other expensive US cities, experienced girls can earn much more.
In particular, dancing at closed parties and other events.
Average earnings of strippers in low-cost states and cities
Traditionally, the southern states of the country are considered less wealthy. Accordingly, in them, representatives of any profession, including strippers, earn a little less, but the difference with expensive states is not critical.
$61,700
Naturally, even in relatively inexpensive states, there are strippers who earn much more, but none of them really makes much more because of their high incomes taxes prescribed by the laws of the state.
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Repairman's Day
Employees of the British company Direct Line Insurance, who regularly go out to repair communal problems in houses and on the streets of England, collected call statistics and came to the conclusion that Monday is the unluckiest day of the week. Over the past year, the firm has compiled a long list of unfortunate Monday coincidences. It is on Mondays, as calculated by Direct Line Insurance, that most accidents, blockages and other troubles occur - and just at the moment when citizens are least prepared for it. For example, in 44 cases out of 100, when there is a power outage in someone's house on Monday, it happens just when the owner of the house is going to watch his favorite show. An average of 2226 Britons suffer from such troubles every year. The company's statisticians do not provide a plausible explanation for the data it has collected. Therefore, the only assumption that can be made based on them is that both the British themselves and their life support systems are overstressed over the weekend, and this leads to system failures on the first day of the working week.
Brazilian death ban
Roberto Pereira da Silva, the mayor of the Brazilian city of Biritiba Mirim, issued a decree prohibiting residents from dying until a new order is issued. The mayor substantiates his decision by the fact that there is no place left for burials at the local cemetery. The mayor's statement, titled "No death in Biritiba Mirima," stressed that "violators of the decree will be fined." The ban will be in effect until the construction of a new cemetery in the city, but for now, residents are instructed to better monitor their health. The mayor also sent a message to the municipal assembly of legislators, noting the catastrophic situation regarding burials in the city cemetery and proposing to reconsider the law prohibiting the construction of another cemetery in the city. As the mayor's office explained, the purpose of the steps taken by the mayor is only to ensure that the residents of the city put pressure on their deputies, and they cancel the outdated legislative act.
Price misprint
