a big name designer without a huge trawl of lines (i.e. Raf at Jil circa 2006) might get paid about $250K Euro/year for a job like that. It's not pauper money, but at that level they're not in it for the money either, you can tell by the numbers. Obviously, Raf has other sources of income as well now, and can afford to bask in wall to wall art.... but many of them just stick with that one paycheck. It's a practical art. It could be worse, they could be getting chef money....