Oddly, I've actually had some inside exposure to how the massage therapy industry works in the U.S.
ModusPwnd said:
But the owner does "make" that 55%... Surely some of the cost has to go to utilities, rent, taxes, etc. I bet that comes out of the owner's 55%, not the masseuse's 45%. So only if utilities, rent, taxes, etc are less than 10% of the total take does your statement hold true. I doubt that is the case. Do you think that makes sense? The building and electricity have to cost something...
There are a lot of expenses, some of them hidden expenses. No argument from me there. But more often it's the massage therapist who faces a good chunk of some of these expenses.
Mostly though, who pays for what varies quite a lot from one business to the next.
There are
some massage therapy businesses where massage therapists are like employees. But this is more the exception than the rule.
Commonly early on, when the massage therapist is learning the business, the massage therapist works for the school for essentially no cut at all until he or she completes training and can get his or her massage therapy license.
Once licensed, and working at a business, the massage therapist is
usually (at least from my exposure) treated as an independent contractor. That's a subtle yet important difference for this conversation. Because in this situation, the proprietor of the business does not need to contribute anything that most employers do like health care, unemployment benefits, social security, tax withholding, retirement benefits, etc. It's completely up to the massage therapist to keep a handle on these things. And at the end of the year when doing taxes, it's not a simple matter of submitting a W2 form, rather the massage therapist must file taxes as if he or she is running his or her own business.
The proprietor owns the building (or takes care of its lease), decor, and
probably owns the massage tables. The proprietor might also own the sheets/bedding and take care of the laundry too, but that's not universal. Sometimes it's up to the massage therapists to wash their own sheets,even if that means taking them to the laundromat [Edit: and trust me, there are a lot of sheets. Every single massage equates to another set of sheets to wash]. And then there are the oils, possibly incense, maybe stones (some massage techniques use stones), and such, and who pays for such things depends on the business. But it often falls on the shoulders of the therapist.
So I agree that that there are a lot of overhead expenses, and the business proprietor takes care of quite a lot of them, but the therapist has his or her own expenses too (except in very rare cases).
It depends on the establishment and situation. Some restaurants will add a "gratuity charge," perhaps around 15%, in certain situations such as the bill being larger than some amount. 
