Salary
Average Salary: $100,000
Expected Lifetime Earnings: $4,174,800
One of the primary benefits of being an intellectual is that intellectuals get paid an awful lot of money to solve problems. And what is math besides one big problem? To most people, it's such a big problem that after they leave high school, the most math they do involves adding and subtracting in their bank accounts. You'll still be doing that too, only with an extra couple of zeroes at the end.
On average, Mathematicians make around $100,000 a year. Those who work in technology and engineering tend to make even more than the more mundane mathy people. The fields of the future like computational mathematics, data mining, and robotics, are in high demand. Therefore they pay a lot more than your typical financial analyst or long-division loving mathematics teacher (who makes a paltry $50,000 in comparison).
A Ph.D. will further your money-making abilities. This will allow you to choose between positions at some of the most prestigious schools in the entire world, or receive grants to create a formula-based on robotic life and its reaction to pictures of fluffy bunnies. $200,000 a year is not unheard of for even the least-popular Doctor of Cool Math Stuff. If you add in a smidge of personality, you might be able to be paid to give speeches and presentations as well.
Then there are the governmental contracts, also known as Sweet Research Candy. If your ideas hit the right notes and good ole' Uncle Sam likes your work, he'll start making it rain taxpayer-funded dollars. The biggest spender in the United States is the Department of Defense, and they just love a good advancement in artificial intelligence.
If government funding isn't your cup of tea, the private sector is also willing to lend a helping hand. Upstarts you may have heard of, like Google or SpaceX or Virgin, offer jobs, contracts, and prizes of the highest caliber to the greatest mathematical minds.
Isn't it time you got your palms around some of that?