“There's a ton of dentists. So dentists earn more income than all of the professional sports leagues combined.”
Planet Money · Money & Markets · September 2026
Zwick, an economist who studies who actually makes up the top 1%, is walking the hosts down a ranked list of industries — dentists come in at number 21, ahead of most of what people picture when they picture wealth. He adds immediately that the comparison is "a funny statistic" that he thinks comes from a dental lobbying organization. His larger argument is that the road to the 1% runs through Main Street businesses, not Silicon Valley or Wall Street.
Transcript
Dentists.
Multi-millionaire, stealthy, wealthy dentists? Yeah,
dentists. There's a ton of dentists. So dentists earn more income than all of the professional sports leagues combined.
Wow.
Which is like a funny statistic from, I think, I mean, from a dental lobbying organization that we like talking about.
Ironically, I'm smiling at that statistic right now. Your teeth are great, Greg. Oh. So, anyways, the road to the 1%, it turned out to be pretty darn diverse. It wasn't just like Silicon Valley and Wall Street. It's like businesses you see walking down your local main street. And