While you’re trying to scrape up enough change from the crevice between your driver’s seat and your car’s center console in order to afford a crispy chicken quesadilla from Taco Bell, dead celebrities are making crazy bank. Despite being dead, there are celebrities who are killing it in the afterlife when it comes to making money.
Forbes released their annual Top-Earning Dead Celebrities List for 2017 and Michael Jackson was #1 yet again. From October 15, 2016, through October 15, 2017, before deducting fees for agents, managers, and lawyers, Michael Jackson made $75 million in pretax income. Jackson, who has been dead since 2009, has topped the list for five straight years. A majority of Jackson’s earnings are derived from a new greatest hits album, a Las Vegas Cirque du Soleil show and his stake in the EMI music publishing catalog. That’s right, even corpses are outhustling you.
Singers dominated the list including Elvis Presley, who has been dead for 44 years, who made $35 million, good enough for fourth place on the list. Bob Marley comes in at #5 on the list by making $23 million despite passing away in 1981. Recently deceased Tom Petty made $20 million since last October, earning the sixth position on the list. Prince passed away on April 21, 2016, and he appeared at the #7 spot by earning $12 million. The 11th top-earning dead celeb is David Bowie, who died in January of 2016, but still raked in $9.6 million.
Golf legend Arnold Palmer is #2 on the top-earning celebrity list for 2017 after he made $40 million, thanks to the Arizona lemonade and ice tea drink named after him. Palmer died on September 25, 2016, less than a month before the list began. Third on the list is Palmer is Peanuts comics creator Charles Schulz with $38 million.
See the entire list over at Forbes.