$60k would be great if that were all income, but the majority of it isn't. After everything is accounted for (product cost, equipment depreciation, studio space, updated samples, advertising, etc), the profit amounts to 20-30% of it We spend about $1500/mo here just on studio rent and utilities.
I won't go into your second paragraph, though, because that mostly boils down to a difference of opinion.
It seems counterintuitive to simply list cost of rent and utilities when discussing photographers as if no other business suffers the same. It'd be more interesting to list expenses specific to the industry.
Yes, obvious standards costs of business, but the post above does the calculation: 2k x 30 = 60k salary. If you're arguing with someone who doesn't have the basics down, that's the place to start.
I did say "gross $60k", and I meant something more like "revenue" than "salary".
Obviously there are expenses that come out of the basic fees, but when I was doing this, the people I talked to at the lower end of the cost spectrum seemed to operate without some of the expenses that came up (ie, home studio, little/no advertising).
The point I was trying to make was, wedding photography is competitive but potentially lucrative if you can establish yourself, particularly in markets like SF.
I won't go into your second paragraph, though, because that mostly boils down to a difference of opinion.