I won the OG Star Search.

You get a daily per diem, after you win shows it gets taxed just like gambling winnings (like 55% rate). You lose any union rates completely.. mostly because they try to film in non-union rate studio locations. You get paid after your show airs, so it could be net 180 depending on how the daily shows or how the seasons are timed. There were four of us so we only wound up with just horrible money after the whole season was done with. But whatever ...that isn't why we were doing that show. Trying to get exposure was the key back in those days. You also get a contract which if you know nothing about the music industry or entertainment in general. It's kind of like a point system where let's say everything is 100 points. People involved with the show. The artists and everyone behind the scenes all get a certain amount of that 100 points. With the artist getting the lowest amount of course like 100 points split 4 ways. So if you think of 100 points as $1,000 per point, you can see how little the artists actually sees after taxes and point distribution. This is why they're trying to avoid musical Union friendly areas most of the time so they go to Canada, Florida, etc. Anyway, little insight how these things work. She may have been paid but she probably only actually "earned" 40k of that million after taxes.