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Celebrating Father's Day: What Top 60 TV Dads Earn!

Ever wondered how much TV dads earn? CNN Money and Salary.com have now calculated what the top 60 paid TV dads would earn today. When it comes to being a favorite father on the small screen, the paycheck and glamour factor of a character's job has increased over time, according to Salary.com, which released its TV Dad Salary Analysis in honor of Father's Day. Today's TV dads average salaries of $195,000 after adjusting for inflation, according to Salary.com. By contrast, the favorite TV fathers of the 1950s made an average of about $75,000 a year in today's dollars. Two dads from TV primetime soaps--Blake Carrington of Dynasty and J.R. Ewing of Dallas top the list. But are they really known as TV dads? At #3 is Diff'rent Strokes dad Philip Drummond at over 720,000 a year as President of his company. George Jefferson of The Jeffersons is at #5 and Dr. Cliff Huxtable of The Cosby Show is at #12. I never would have thought that George made more than Cliff. Some other famous TV dads over $100,000 a year include: Walter Findley of Maude, Tim Taylor of Home Improvement, Jason Seaver of Growing Pains, and Danny Tanner of Full House. At the "high" middle class level we have Home Simpson at $65,000 a year--who knew he made that much! Others include Andy Taylor of The Andy Griffith Show, Darrin Stevens of Bewitched, and Henry Mitchell of Dennis the Menace all over $50,000, but less than $100,000 a year. At the regular middle class level (about 40-$50,000 a year) we have Howard Cunningham of Happy Days, Carl Winslow of Family Matters, Herman Munster of The Munsters, Ray Barone of Everybody Loves Raymond, Ward Cleaver of Leave it to Beaver, Archie Bunker of All in the Family, Mike Brady of The Brady Bunch, and Steve Keaton of Family Ties. At below middle class we have Fred G. Sanford of Sanford & Son, Al Bundy of Married...with Children, Tony Micelli of Who's the Boss?, all less than $30,000 a year. At the bottom of the list is the unemployed James Evans, Sr. of Good Times making...well, nothing at all.
See the article and the entire top 60 TV dad salary list here.