Kanye West Is Suddenly The Highest Paid Rapper In The World

Maybe there is a method to Kanye's madness. After a year of getting little but bad press, West has emerged as Forbes's highest-paid Hip Hop act for the first time ever, crushing JAY-Z, Drake, and Diddy in overall 2019 revenue.

Almost all of Ye's $150 million income comes from his footwear and apparel company Yeezy, which is going to do about $1.5 billion in revenue this year.

Here are the top 20 highest-paid in the game:

1. Kanye West ($150 million)

2. Jay-Z ($81 million)

3. Drake ($75 million)

4. Diddy ($70 million)

5. Travis Scott ($58 million)

6. Eminem ($50 million)

7. DJ Khaled ($40 million)

8. Kendrick Lamar ($38.5 million)

9. Migos ($36 million)

10. Childish Gambino ($35 million)

11. J. Cole ($31 million)

12. Nicki Minaj ($29 million)

13. Cardi B ($28 million)

14. Swizz Beatz ($23 million)

15. Meek Mill ($21 million)

16. Birdman ($20 million)

17. Future ($19.5 million)

18. Nas ($19 million)

19. Wiz Khalifa ($18.5 million)

20. Pitbull ($18 million)

Here's how Forbes gets its data:

"Our numbers represent pretax income from June 2018 to June 2019 before deducting fees for agents, managers and lawyers; figures are based on data from Nielsen Music, Pollstar, Bandsintown and interviews with experts, handlers and some of the stars themselves."