He probably pulls 500k+ from the whole ecosystem,but the fact that such a popular product as Vue JS can only bring in $150K in support is a reality check.
Is it really? The guy is making a living thanks to his own personal project and it's bad he's not a millionaire, especially since you note his revenue might not be limited to his Patreon only?
He might earn much more in the golden handcuffs of a FAANG, but his is a pretty incredible scenario by all metrics, especially if you consider the reality of the whole job market, not the SV niche making millions a year working at Google & co.
Don't get me wrong, I don't equate $150K to peanuts, far from it,but my point is that if a project of such success brings this much,what chances people have with smaller projects that are good but nowhere near to Vue JS popularity.
He also has +150 sponsors on GitHub, but it doesn't changes the reality that a software engineer at his level can cut of a deal from any FAANG company for a Staff SWE role, which will be probably between 450-700K/year band.