The Government Has Confirmed The Aussie Musician Earning $300K A Year Is Fake

It turns out that the Australian Government’s $300,000-earning guitarist Stephanie is surprisingly not real.

Earlier this week it was reported that the Australian Government had published a case study on their Budget 2015 website, who went by the name of Stephanie, exemplifying how much money a musician in a band makes, confusing many by the exorbitant salary prediction.

As Fairfax reports, the Treasurer’s office has now confirmed what we all already knew – Stephanie is not real. A spokeswoman said that the case studies on the website “are cameos, so there is no real Stephanie”.

They, however, maintain that the figures used in the case study are based on factual evidence. “Treasury says the cameos are based on real tax data … [it] is taken from taxpayers who reported on their tax return that they were ‘Musicians and Entertainers’,” she said.

“Whilst the stereotype of a musician is that they do not earn very much, it is evident from the data that those who ‘primarily’ identify as musicians and have taxable income from that activity earn amounts similar to those that appear on the website.”

That’s obviously going to make many actual full-time musicians wonder where they’re actually getting that data from at a time when music sales and salaries are dwindling, not flourishing.

Sticky Fingers manager Neal Hunt confirmed this to Fairfax saying, “Most developing original bands would be lucky to take home $50 each a night.”

He further explained that while some bands can take home between $350 to $800, however, that was to be shared between the band members. At best, solo artists playing cover versions could pocket $1200 meaning that they would have to gig until their fingers fell off to make up that annual income of $300,000 the government speaks of.

Stephanie is not a solo artist. The budget website describes her as a musician who “performs in a band that she runs as a small sole trader,” meaning Stephanie and her band are probably festival-headliners with six number one records.

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