How much salary do astronauts make in a year? $1 million?

 

Really???

Sean Duffy, the Secretary of Transportation and I believe at this moment still the acting (emphasis on the act part) head of NASA, had this to say about how much salary air traffic controllers earn.

Duffy’s ATC pay comments raise ire among rank-and-file controllers

"In a post on X on October 7, 2025, Duffy wrote: “We are bringing a record amount of new air traffic controllers into the system by speeding up the admissions process. We have hired 20% more controllers this year! Did you know the starting salary for controllers is $180K/year and can go as high as $400K/year? The best and the brightest are joining the ranks and this is going to make YOUR air travel safer and faster.”

Is that real? Simply stated, no.

"While the FAA does not publish a single pay scale labeled “starting salary,” public data from the Office of Personnel Management and the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that most newly trained controllers earn between $70,000 and $90,000 after completing academy training and reporting to their assigned facilities. Entry-level trainees at the academy make closer to $45,000 to $50,000.

Only controllers who have completed years of on-the-job training and achieved Certified Professional Controller (CPC) status at the busiest facilities — such as New York Center, Chicago Center, or Southern California TRACON — can approach $180,000, typically through a combination of locality adjustments, night differentials, and overtime. Even at those facilities, salaries above $200,000 are rare, and the $400,000 figure mentioned by Duffy does not appear in any federal pay data."

So Duffy must think that astronauts make even more than that. They don't; salaries range from about $84K to $152K. 

However, the upcoming NASA administrator, which is surprisingly Jared Isaacman, is quite wealthy.  That's how he could buy SpaceX trips into space.