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Published: Apr 25, 2019 10 min read
Avengers: Endgame
Avengers: Endgame
Courtesy of Marvel

Ahead of the release of Avengers: Endgame, every single detail in the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been dissected. Fans have scrutinized Nick Fury's toast preferences, examined Ant-Man's expansion abilities and teared up reading about Stan Lee's final cameo.

But one thing that hasn't gotten much attention in the run-up to the three-hour-long movie is the earnings of the Avengers themselves.

Though Tony Stark appears to foot the bill for the majority of Avengers-related stuff, everyone manages their own personal finances. Because Avengers: Endgame could make for the highest-grossing box office weekend ever, now is the perfect opportunity to rank the characters by net worth.

Three quick caveats: One, for the purposes of this article, Money is assuming that everyone is alive, Thanos be damned.

Two, we drew the line at 13 Avengers characters, even though there are technically more, for brevity's sake.

Three, we're basing the rankings on previously-published estimates available online, so we can't take credit for the calculations.

Onward.

Black Panther (played by Chadwick Boseman)

As Money reported last year, T'Challa's net worth is impressively high. As king of Wakanda, he oversees the country's supply of Vibranium, meaning he technically has access to $90.7 trillion of the material. To put that in perspective, the current gross world product is just $88 trillion.

To get an idea of just how rich he is, look at T'Challa's decision to buy land in Oakland, California, at the end of Black Panther. It's not a cheap choice. This CityLab story says the average land value per acre in Oakland is $1.4 million ($5.4 million near the city's center), so even if he purchased just two blocks in the right place, he could have spent $11 million.

Thor (Chris Hemsworth)

Thor, the son of King Odin, was born into royalty on his planet of Asgard. As such, he's likely never been short on cash, and neither have his peers: Asgard itself is lavish. The way the economy there operates is nebulous, but according to at least one Reddit thread, it might not even have poverty.

Is Thor richer than T'Challa? It depends on who you ask. They are similar in that Thor has access to pretty much any resource he wants from Asgard, from minerals to fossil fuels, but unlike T'Challa in Wakanda, he can also tap the eight other realms for salable goods.

That said, Thor himself isn't totally clear on how money works, as evidenced by this promotional video where he tries to pay rent to his roommate Daryl with a pumpkin, a couple of goblets and a handful Asgardian coins. When Daryl complains that he can't exchange the coins for real money, Thor retorts that "on Asgard, these coins are worth a gazillion human dollars."

That's what we call muscling in.

Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.)

Tony Stark acts like a wealthy playboy because he is one — according to Forbes' 2013 Fictional 15 rankings, Stark's net worth is $12.4 billion. More recent estimates, like this one from GO Banking Rates, put his net worth closer to $30 billion.

His father's company, Stark Industries, is also a crazy moneymaker, with revenue exceeding $20 billion a year. Forbes once said Stark Industries, "the largest tech conglomerate on Earth," was the 16th biggest fictional company ever. It fell just behind [Willy] Wonka Industries.

No matter what the actual figure is, it's clear Stark doesn't shy away from splurging. He has a $117 million mansion that has a $5.4 million mortgage. He wears $7 billion suits and drives a $2.7 million sports car. Those are some flashy finances.

War Machine (Don Cheadle)

James "Rhodey" Rhodes is an Air Force lieutenant colonel, a job that pays a minimum base salary of about $64,000, according to FederalPay.org. The value of his suit(s) is unclear, but it's likely in the billions because of its armored torso, durability, flight capabilities and machine guns, which is why he's toward the top of this list.

Captain America (Chris Evans)

Steve Rogers figured out a brilliant way to save money on rent, groceries and bills: He got frozen for almost seven decades. His time on ice also helped him earn a small fortune because he was never discharged from the Army.

A couple of years ago, a Reddit user calculated that the government owed Rogers more than $3 million in backpay for his 66 years of (ice-cold) service. The Army then actually commented on the figure, telling Business Insider that a mistake in that Redditor's math meant Rogers may have actually been entitled to a little more. Surely that's enough to buy him a place in Brooklyn.

Star-Lord (Chris Pratt)

Peter Quill is basically a professional scoundrel. It's hard to say what his net worth is, but we know that there's a 40,000-unit bounty on his head in Guardians of the Galaxy — a sum Rocket tells Groot that will make them "rich." Quill later pays a prisoner 30,000 units FOR HIS LEG as part of an escape plan, so, as this Reddit thread points out, he's probably got a good chunk of disposable income.

But man, he still loves that Walkman.

Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch)

Stephen Strange worked as an accomplished neurosurgeon before superhero-dom, and that comes with an average base pay of nearly $490,000, according to Glassdoor. But after being in a car accident that wrecked his hands, Strange went nearly bankrupt trying to fix them. His pal Christine Palmer says as much in the Doctor Strange film, explaining, "Stephen, you always spent money as fast as you can make it, but now you're spending money you don't even have."

That said, uh, now he's a mystical being. So all bets are off.

Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner)

Archer Clint Barton was an agent for the law enforcement agency S.H.I.E.L.D. If we assume S.H.I.E.L.D. is comparable to the CIA, that means Hawkeye could have earned more than $75,000 a year for his work. If we liken the organization to the FBI, his paycheck might be lower, though Quartz pointed out that many agents earn extra money for overtime and location.

He also has investments in real estate. In the movies, we see Barton's safehouse. According to a recent comic book, Barton bought an apartment building in Brooklyn's Bed-Stuy neighborhood (which was likely a costly venture, as homes there can run over $1 million).

But comics writer Matt Fraction told the New York Post that Hawkeye isn't particularly motivated by his bottom line: "He’s recently come into some money, and he doesn’t know what to do with it ... his TV works, his dog has food, he can buy arrows. He’s fine."

Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson)

Natasha Romanoff, a former Russian spy, also worked for S.H.I.E.L.D., so she too was pulling in just under six figures on an annual basis.

Captain Marvel (Brie Larson)

Over the course of Captain Marvel, we learn that Carol Danvers is an Air Force pilot-turned-Kree soldier, which according to PayScale pays an average salary of about $72,000 (the Air Force gig. Not the alien one).

Den of Geek wrote that in the comic books, Danvers had stints as a spy, a freelance writer and a TV consultant, among other odd jobs. A true master of the side hustle.

Spider-Man (Tom Holland)

The current Peter Parker is a high school student, as we see in Spider-Man: Homecoming, so his net worth is probably nearly nonexistent.

But traditionally, Parker works as a photographer for The Daily Bugle newspaper. If he were a staff member (as opposed to a freelancer being paid per picture), that photojournalist gig would typically earn him about $37,000 a year, according to PayScale.

Ant-Man (Paul Rudd)

Scott Lang once stole millions from VistaCorp, but these days he isn't pulling in the big bucks like his co-Avengers. Part of Ant-Man's plot revolves around Lang's difficulty in finding a job due to his criminal record. He ends up working at Baskin-Robbins, where the average hourly rate is $10.79, according to PayScale.

Lang later got fired from the ice cream shop and resorted to theft to scrounge up money for child support, so it's safe to say he places toward the bottom of this list rather than the top.

The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo)

Bruce Banner was once a scientist, which comes with an average $120,000 salary, but his life has changed since becoming The Hulk. Comic book fan site Newsarama once wrote a tongue-in-cheek piece proclaiming him the poorest comic book character. And while his net worth is probably higher than $3.50, Banner's bank account is far from bursting.