I'm SHOCKED 😮- The First Season Of The Mary Tyler Moore Show Valerie Harper Only Made $700 An Episode!

She was a nobody at that time.

I wonder what she made for Rhoda?

I'm guessing 700 bucks a week was lots of money in the 1970s.

Was that good money in the 70s for a TV show?

They couldn't afford to pay her more. The headscarf budget was high enough.

R3 is a former staff writer on “Small Wonder.”!

Not bad considering it was 1970. For comparison the Ford Pinto was priced $1000 at the time.

That's $15,400 for 22 episodes. How much was she in each episode because even in the 1970's that was not much to live on.

There were movies stars making $5000 a week in the 1930's.

It was worth about $5,666.19, at least according to Alexa.

Most people earning over $10,000 annually were considered reasonably well off in 1970. I;m sure Valerie's per e3pisode was significantly more with each year.

My first full time job as an adult was a teller in 1980, and I was earning only $8,000, which was almost poverty wages.

For perspective, the inflation calculator says $700 in 1970 is the equivalent of $5,669.40 in 2024.

And also, wasn't she married during this time to the guy who played Chuckles?

That sounds like a decent salary for someone probably 4th or 5th on the call sheet in 1970.

She didn't have gumption...

R5- The base price on a 1971 Ford Pinto when it was introduced in the fall of 1970 was $ 1,919 not $1,000.

Isn’t that a million dollars in today’s money?

According to the westegg inflation calculator, $15,400 is equivalent to approximately $123,000 today. I wouldn't mind making that for working only 22 weeks.

But yes, TV and even movie stars back then made far less money than they do today.

Geez, I wonder what Cloris made.

Did MTM sjow have distinctions between regular and featured players? Because outside of Mary, none of the other actors were in the opening credits, which is usually how you know who is a regular and who is featured (featured are usually not in the opening credits). With that said, it must have been understood that Asner, Macleod, Knight, and Harper were regulars. I'm not sure if Leachman was though, as she wasn't in nearly as many episodes as the rest of them.