Nicki Minaj the only lady in Forbes’ top 20 Hip-Hop Richlist

by James O’Toole

Nicki Minaj is the only woman who made the cut on the 2014 top 20 of World’s Highest-Paid Hip-Hop Acts at number 11. Minaj’s $14 million earnings in 2014 have come from an array of endorsements from the likes of Mac, OPI and Pepsi, as well as her own Myx fusions, the fruit-infused, single serve moscato wine beverage.

In an earlier interview, Minaj told the FORBES contributor, Susannah Breslin: “I’ve never been afraid to walk into the boy’s club, ever. Ever, ever, ever…I kind of think of myself almost like a man. I’m not going to fall back from something because it’s never been done before by a woman. It’s time for a female Jay, a female Puffy.”

Dr. Dre gets the 2014 hip-hop cash crown with pretax earnings of $620 million. Dre’s cash has come mainly from the cash windfall from Apple, who earlier this year paid $3 billion to purchase Beats, the company founded by Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre.

“Not only is that the highest annual total of any entertainer ever evaluated by FORBES, it’s more than the combined earnings of all 24 of his companions on the 2014 Hip-Hop Cash Kings list.”

A long way down to the No. 2 spot, are Diddy and Jay Z, who tied at $60 million each.

The full Rich list:

1. Dr. Dre: $620 million
2. Jay-Z: $60 million (tie)
3. Diddy: $60 million (tie)
4. Drake: $33 million
5. Macklemore & Ryan Lewis: $32 million
6. Kanye West: $30 million
7. Birdman: $24 million
8. Lil Wayne: $23 million
9. Pharrell Williams: $22 million
10. Eminem: $18 million
11. Nicki Minaj: $14 million
12. Wiz Khalifa: $13 million
13. Pitbull: $12 million
14. Snoop Dogg: $10 million
15. Kendrick Lamar: $9 million
16. Ludacris: $8 million (tie)
17. Tech N9ne: $8 million (tie)
18. Swizz Beatz: $8 million (tie)
19. 50 Cent: $8 million (tie)
20. Rick Ross: $7 million (tie)
21. J. Cole: $7 million (tie)
22. DJ Khaled: $7 million (tie)
23. Lil Jon: $7 million (tie)
24. Mac Miller: $7 million (tie)

Forbes explains the criteria deployed to arrive at this rich list: “To form this year’s Cash Kings list, we considered income from touring, record sales, publishing, merchandise sales, endorsements and other ventures. Management, agent and attorney fees are not deducted. Earnings are calculated from June 2013 to June 2014 and based on data from Pollstar, the RIAA and Nielsen SoundScan, and from interviews with managers, lawyers, executives and some of the artists themselves.”