A ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ windfall drives Vance’s income to as much as $7.4 million

Vice President JD Vance earned as much as $7.4 million last year, most of it tracing to a massive commercial revival for his decade-old memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy.”

Newly released financial disclosures by the Office of Government Ethics show that Vance’s rise to national office has fueled a commercial revival of the book, with domestic royalties from publisher HarperCollins now accounting for the largest share of his income.

This year’s filing shows that Vance’s domestic book royalties fell within the $1,001,000 to $5,000,000 range in his 2025 federal financial disclosure. A year earlier, they fell in a far more modest bracket: $50,001 to $100,000. The jump means that Vance collected somewhere between $901,000 and $4.9 million more from U.S. book sales alone compared to 2024 — at least a 20-fold increase.

The scale of that windfall stands out against the rest of Vance’s portfolio, which barely moved. The 17-page financial disclosure released this week shows that Vance remains a dedicated holder of cryptocurrency, with personal bitcoin holdings valued between $250,001 and $500,000 — the same range he reported the year before.

Vance’s financial gains are not confined to the U.S. For the first time, the filing included new lines tracking international royalties, advances and foreign rights — a sign of the global market that opened as his political profile rose. He reported deals with publishers in Germany (Ullstein), Japan (Kobun-sha), Poland (Wydawnictwo Marginesy) and Brazil (Editora Intrinseca).

Of these international agreements, his largest upfront payout came from China, where publisher Beijing Mediatime paid Vance $59,500.

The filings also trace how these millions flow into Vance’s personal accounts. While the underlying intellectual property is handled through his agency, William Morris Endeavor, the actual payments are routed through his primary corporate holding entity, JD Vance Enterprises LLC, of which Vance remains a member.

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