Who makes over $500,000 a year?

Professions which allow you to make over $500K a year

• Corporate Law (a.k.a "BigLaw"): 

  Corporate lawyers working for the biggest firms have a path towards the $500k/year mark if they're lucky enough to be tapped into the partnership of the firm. Entry requirements in the US are usually entrance into a T14 (top 14) law school, being above median in your classes and kicking ass outside of your classes in stuff like law review, club leadership etc. Law school nowadays is extremely expensive and will set you back $150k+ in loans.
• Starting comp as an associate is now at $180k + bonus but you'll work for it, doing 70+ hours a week is not easy by any stretch of the word but if you can trudge through it for the 7–8 year track towards partnership you'll have visibility to make $500k or more. Remember our previous categories? This one falls into the revenue generating and ownership categories.

• Investment Banking (a.k.a "IBD"): 

  Investment banking is the fabled road towards conventional success in the 'vanilla' world of finance. It's captured mounds upon mounds of top tier uni graduates because of its optionality, the allure of working on 'high profile' deals, the prestige, but best of all the money. If you're at a target or semi-target university and you have the right grades, CV (or resume as you americans call it), personality traits and hunger you could land yourself an internship offer with the potential to convert into a full time gig. Non-target students also frequently get in too, especially if they network.
• Starting total comp usually falls somewhere in the $100–200k across the 2–3 years you're an analyst, this ramps up to $200–430k as an associate, then $350–750k as a VP. From VP onwards, the role becomes strictly revenue generative and your compensation is completely tied to how well you and the bank performs.
• Hours start of terribly, with most analysts pulling 75–80+ hours a week on average, with peaks of 100 or more. However, the more senior you become, the more your hours decrease and the greater visibility you have over your schedule. Albeit, travelling increases substantially

• Sales, Trading and Structuring + Research (a.k.a "S&T", "Securities" or "Markets"):

   Similar to IB in that the schools and pedigree are fairly equal however these roles are very different. The markets side of a bank is a full on meritocracy, your advancement and by extension compensation is a function of how much money you can make. Starting off, you'll be shadowing experienced salespeople, traders and structurers but as you progress you start getting your own book of business. Sky is the limit in terms of your payout as you usually get a paid a % of what you produce.

• The Buyside (HF, PE, VC, AM):

• HF ("Hedge Funds"): 

  There are all sorts of hedge funds out there ranging from systematic/quant to fundamental equity. Usually, you'll need to spend time in either IB, Consulting or a combo of either of the former + Private Equity to have a shot at the more 'fundamental' funds and a background in trading for the more 'macro/product specific' funds. Some funds (especially quant) recruit out of undergrad however. Same thing as trading, if you work for a decent sized fund and perform you will hit $500k/year.

• PE ("Private Equity"): 

  A junior banker's wet dream, you most likely will need banking or top tier consulting experience to get into this area. Though, some firms do recruit out of undergrad. At the larger funds, with 2–3 years experience you can usually command an all-in comp package of $250–300k a year (with some outliers above that) and at smaller ones $150–250k a year. Suffice it to say as you rise up the ranks this will scale exponentially as you begin to gain carried interest points, it's not unreasonable to surpass $500k/year after 5–8 years of being in the industry.

• AM ("Asset Management"): 

  Big firms usually recruit for investment roles out of undergrad and b-school, however some are poached out of IB/Research. You work initially as an Analyst, working your way up from junior to senior and eventually, get given the opportunity to become a portfolio manager. Senior analysts and PMs at decently sized funds make well in excess of $500k/year

• VC ("Venture Capital"): 

  Similar to PE, but more tilted towards ex-entrepreneurs. Partners and senior level investment professionals at decently sized VC funds make in excess of $500k/year, especially when you factor in carried interest.

• Executive Management: 

  If you play the office politics right, whether you start off in engineering, HR, Finance etc, you'll have the potential to land into an executive role after 15+ years of experience in a field. You start off as a Director, working your way up to Sr Director, VP and eventually, SVP/EVP or a Chief position. VPs at medium to large companies pull in more than $500k/year

• Medicine: 

  Certain specialities of medicine like orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, plastics, anaesthetics etc can yield salaries of above $500k/year. The catch is you have to go through 8 years of school, where you amass bucketloads of debt then a further 6–8 years of intense training on low salaries before you can command a high salary.

• Software Engineering: 

  Some companies (Google, Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, Netflix, Uber etc) are shelling out total compensation (salary + stock + bonus) in excess of $500k/year to very senior engineers, but the path to get there is opaque. It requires either starting your own company and being acquired, or working on high profile projects. New grad comp is now ~$130–180k, and the requirements are quite strict. You'll need a high level of technical competency to stand a chance at one of the interviews here.

• Sales: 

  High end sales of big ticket products: human capital (headhunting), luxury goods, real estate, can yield above $500k/year if you are good. I would drop private banking, wealth management and financial advisory in here too.

• Consulting: 

  Similar to IB in terms of structure and requirements but the job role differs. Consulting is more about problem solving and giving advice than IB. At the top end of consulting firms, those at the junior partner level (provided you stick through all the grueling travel and the hours), will make in excess of $500k/year.

• Accounting: 

  Early and mid career compensation at the larger firms is a lot lower than other similar careers in this list but more experienced partners can pull in excess of $500k/year.

• Entrepreneurship: 

• 
  

  Sky's the limit here. Could be a solo consulting practice, a restaurant (or chain of restaurants), a tech company.. Anything that creates value to customers and where you have significant ownership can pay well.

Those are the accessible careers at least. More talent based jobs would require you to be in the top 0.01% of talent to stand a chance at making a career out of it that would yield more than the stated figure. Things like professional sports, modelling, art, acting etc have a power distribution with those at the top commanding most of the value.
Hope that helps :)