Taylor Swift Slays One Direction, Adele, Madonna, And Rihanna In List Of Music’s Highest Earners

Taylor Swift may have been experiencing a backlash since this summer, but it hasn’t affected her stardom. Billboard has the news.

“We already had an idea of how much Taylor Swift was separating herself from the rest of the financial field this year when Forbes declared her the year’s highest-paid woman in music. Now, they’ve removed gender from the equation and made it official: In 2016, no one in music is getting money like T-Swift.”

The article adds that Swift made an estimated $170 million thanks to her mega-successful “1989 Tour” and various product endorsements. That’s about $60 million more than their second-biggest earner, One Direction, who still ranked in $110 million. Adele came in third with $80 million, Madonna came in fourth with $76.5 million, and Rihanna came in fifth with $75 million.

It’s been a pretty tough year for Taylor Swift, as she has continued to face a backlash over having “white privilege,” how she’s overrated, and how she’s a very mean person behind the scenes. Then, it all exploded when Kanye West broke Taylor’s bubble with a video that Kim Kardashian made public. In July, E! Online described the video that caused a huge backlash against Taylor Swift because it supposedly revealed she lied.

“In case you missed the big news, Kim Kardashian headed to the popular app where she posted video of a phone call between Kanye West and Taylor Swift. During the conversation, the music performers were overheard discussing certain lyrics from the highly publicized ‘Famous’ track.”

The article added that Taylor Swift responded to the video in a lengthy Instagram post.

Still, the backlash continued, and Taylor Swift lost the battle — at least in terms of PR. Many made it into a racial issue, where Swift, with “white privilege,” was pounding on a minority rapper, Kanye West. Even Vice entered the discussion, which some thought was ridiculous.

“Swift’s positioning to blackness, specifically black men, couldn’t be more different. Over and over again, the pop singer has played the victim, tapping into racial anxieties and expectations around black men and young white women.”

The article adds that because stories about Swift petting the Weeknd’s hair and the fact that she released music videos glamorizing white colonial rule in Africa proved that Taylor Swift was racist.

The feminist site Wear Your Voice even went as far as to refer to Taylor as “that b***h that lives for white feminism.”

“Here’s the gag though: Taylor’s been lying for months, trying to write fairy tales and fallacies about the song and lyrics of ‘Famous’ being unbeknownst to her. Taylor, and the trickery of white feminism, are the biggest scammers of all time,” wrote author Ashleigh Shackelford, who many said didn’t realize that the title of her article and some of the contents completely went against what feminism is supposed to stand for.

However, Taylor Swift’s fans defended her endlessly on Twitter.

Several months went by, with Taylor Swift publicly remaining low. Then, more than a week ago, CNN revealed that Kanye West had been hospitalized after many public meltdowns. After the whole Taylor Swift fiasco, Kanye had gone after Beyonce, Jay-Z, Drake, and others. Many thought that even though Kanye West’s hospitalization after his mental breakdown was unfortunate, Taylor Swift had been completely vindicated.

Whether or not Taylor Swift has been vindicated hasn’t affected her business dealings one single bit. In fact, as Billboard reported last month, Ms. Swift has signed a multi-year deal with AT&T. The first part of the deal is Swift headlining a Pre-Super Bowl concert on February 4. It looks like 2017 could be a very big year for Taylor.

[Featured Image by Rick Diamond/Getty Images]