History Main / EvilPaysBetter

* In the Web Game ''The West'', jobs like grave-robbing, house-robbing, coach-robbing and train-robbing pay poorly but have a ''huge'' chance of turning up some very good items that would cost you a fortune to buy - not to mention they're worth a lot too. The only offset is that you're more likely to get injured, but that isn't much of an offset since you can regain your health rapidly anyway.
** Also, some of the The West quests split into being 'good' and being 'bad' (or lawful and unlawful). The 'bad' choice has a tendency to provide better rewards.

** ''[[VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion Oblivion]]'':
*** The [[ThievesGuild Thieves]] (illegal) and [[AdventureGuild Fighters]] (legal) Guilds would often reward you with [[DudeWheresMyReward paltry sums of gold]] when progressing through the ranks, but the rewards suddenly become better near the end, giving you powerful magical items and such, along with superior long-term benefits. The [[MagicalSociety Mages' Guild]] (legal) and [[MurderInc Dark Brotherhood]] (illegal) however, tend to give you the very powerful items and spells along the way, with the final rewards and long-term benefits being rather inferior compared to the former two guilds. The Mages Guild is also the only way (without [[GameMod mods]] or [[DownloadableContent DLC]]) that you can get access to Enchanting and Spellmaking (which open up a whole new world of [[GameBreaker Game Breakers]]), but since they're not evil we'll just leave it there.

** Zig-Zagged in ''VideoGame/GradTheftAutoV''. Failure to get paid for various crimes is a regular occurance, and one of the best payin jobs is Franklin's assassinations that target {{Asshole Victim}}s, and the best money from that is made by strategic stock trading. In the MultipleEndings, only [[spoiler:killing Trevor nets Franklin and Michael more money]], while if [[spoiler:Franklin kills Michael, Michael's share is given to his family]], so [[TakingTheThirdOption "Death Wish"]] is generally considered the preferred way to end the game.

* Inverted in ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid3'': while you may choose to pave your way with piles of corpses, every single soldier you kill, as opposed to tranq or avoid entirely will attack you during your brief stint on the Other Side, where you face The Sorrow. If you've killed a lot, this sequence can take an agonizingly long time (but it can be pretty funny if you [[GroinAttack shoot everyone in the nuts]]. Also, defeating bosses by non-lethal means nets you their camouflage, while killing them gives you a fat lot of nothing.

* In ''WesternAnimation/TheIncredibles'', Mr. Incredible and Elastigirl are superheroes who live a mundane life on a fixed income with Mr. Incredible hating his dead-end job. [[BigBad Syndrome]] is a supervillain who lives on a privately owned island paradise with billions of dollars to his name and a "job" he absolutely loves. When Mr. Incredible ends up (unknowingly) in the employ of Syndrome, he's suddenly making exorbitant amounts of money.

* ''VideoGame/OverlordII'' gives you the option of [[LawfulEvil Domination]] or [[ChaoticEvil Destruction]]. The former involves subjugating peasants to make your slaves, generating resources over time. The latter is basically the KillEmAll option, getting all of the resources at once with no opportunities to get any later.

** This is actually one of the major themes of ''VideoGame/FableIII''. Once you overthrow your evil brother and become the King/Queen of Albion, you learn that [[spoiler:an EldritchAbomination is coming to destroy the kingdom, and that the entire reason your brother was acting like such an evil tyrant was because he needed to raise a ''lot'' of money ''fast'' in order to train and equip and army powerful enough to defeat it]]. You are then faced with the same dilemma as him: [[MeetTheNewBoss Rule as an evil tyrant]] in order to make more money but have your subjects hate you like they hated him, or rule benevolently and have everyone love you but risk not making enough money to [[spoiler:defend the kingdom when the time comes]]. Or you could just TakeAThirdOption and buy up all the real estate for sale and rent it out, raking in more than enough cash to fill the kingdom's coffers while still being a benevolent ruler.
*** Then again, the investment tactics from the previous game work here, and the day of invasion doesn't get any closer as long as you don't complete any main story quests. So waiting around long enough and the income from your properties can be channeled into as many beneficent programs as you like.

*** Azura's Daedric quest has you retrieve Azura's Star from an evil wizard who seeks to corrupt it for his own nefarious purposes. If you do so and purify the corruption, you receive it as a reusable Grand Soul Gem and gain Aranea Ienith as a potential follower. On the other hand, you can instead choose to complete the corruption and transform it into the Black Star, a reusable ''Black'' Soul Gem (i.e. can hold humanoid souls). Black Soul Gems are rather rare and any humanoid soul is equivalent to a Grand Soul, even if it comes from a weak Level 1 bandit in the early areas of the game.

** This is actually one of the major themes of ''VideoGame/FableIII'' -Once you become the King of Albion, you have to choose between making good and evil decisions. Evil decisions generally reward you with more money, but earn you the animosity of your people and former allies; whereas good decisions please these people but put the nation in debt, making it much harder to amass the gold you need to protect Albion. Sure, your tenants will hate you for making them pay a massive debt, but they'll hate you more for letting more of the kingdom get killed. [[spoiler:[[TheChainsOfCommanding Making evil decisions to raise more money is partially the reason why the Kingdom hated your brother in the first place]]]].

* ''Fanfic/GuysBeingDudes'': It's briefly mentioned that Arlo, a [[Franchise/{{Pokemon}} Team Rocket]] member, gets paid more than [[VideoGame/Pokemon Go Candela]], and presumably the other team leaders, do.

* In ''VideoGame/TinStarChoiceOfGames'', you'll be lucky to keep your horse shod on a marshal's salary. You want more? Well, you can get a bit from prospecting, practicing a profession or other honest work...or you can take bribes from the town's CorruptHick sheriff, pocket fines that you collect from lawbreakers, extort businesses in town, and even rob stagecoaches or side with the bad guys, and end the game as the richest person in the northern hemisphere. Up to you.

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* Gradually deconstructed in ''Series/BreakingBad'' in which evil does indeed pay better... for a short while, at least. But then, the characters start running into the central problem of this trope -- that while it's possible to make huge amounts within an underground illegal black-economy, at a certain point you end up making so much that there's no way that you can actually ''spend any of it''. Because if you do, the government will gradually notice that you're spending more than you're earning legally -- and, more importantly, more than you should be paying to the government in the form of taxes. And even money-laundering only helps so much, since outside of massive-scale international criminal organisations only a certain amount can actually be laundered before the same issue crops up again. And on top of that, making millions illegally tends to attract the attention of the greedy who would like to get their hands on your money and, being in the criminal underworld, are not shy about employing ruthless methods of doing so. Essentially, the key problem is that eventually evil pays ''too'' well to the point where it's more of a burden than anything else. [[spoiler: This gradually ends with the main character finding himself possessing a ridiculously large pile of money which he just has no way of actually making any practical use from because doing so will immediately bring the full weight of law enforcement down upon him.]]

* Gradually deconstructed in ''Series/BreakingBad'' in which evil does indeed pay well... for a short while, at least. But then, the characters start running into the central problem of this trope -- that while it's possible to make huge amounts within an underground illegal black-economy, at a certain point you end up making so much that there's no way that you can actually ''spend any of it''. Because if you do, the government will gradually notice that you're spending more than you're earning legally -- and, more importantly, more than you should be paying to the government in the form of taxes. And even money-laundering only helps so much, since outside of massive-scale international criminal organisations only a certain amount can actually be laundered before the same issue crops up again. And on top of that, making millions illegally tends to attract the attention of the greedy who would like to get their hands on your money and, being in the criminal underworld, are not shy about employing ruthless methods of doing so. [[spoiler: This gradually ends with the main character finding himself possessing a ridiculously large pile of money which he just has no way of actually making any practical use from because doing so will immediately bring the full weight of law enforcement down upon him.]]

*** The ''Honest Hearts'' add-on actually subverts this though. At any point in the story you can opt to simply kill an important character, which immediately ends the story and gives you a quick simple fetch quest to finish off the add-on, give you your exp and final weapon rewards and resumes the main game. This means you can effectively finish a several hour add-on in 5 minutes. However you'll only get the full item rewards if you solve everyone's problems and finish the whole thing. The quick evil solution actually denies you rewards as well as pissing of [[{{Determinator}} Joshua]] [[MadeOfIron Graham]].

* ''Manga/ShiawaseKanakoNoKoroshiyaSeikatsu'': Kanako Nishino's job hunting accidentally brings her to the offices of a group of assassins. She initially panics and wonders how to get out of there... ''then'' she hears about the great pay, steady work hours, weekends off, and even the recent addition of a benefits package. To top of all off, she's a ''natural'' at the job despite having no formal training before joining up.

* ''WesternAnimation/OKKOLetsBeHeroes'': Money is [[MadScientist Professor Venomous']] main reason for being [[CardCarryingVillain who he is]]. [[spoiler:Not only did villainy give him the emotional security and confidence he lacked for years as Laserblast, it also made him filthy rich.]]

* ''Franchise/SimCity'':
** ''VideoGame/SimCity'' as a whole tends to do this. If you're low on cash, you can bet that a sleazy character will offer you cash in order to build something for them. These tend to be things such as toxic waste facilities, missile silos, [[{{Area51}} "secret" military bases]], [[ArsonMurderAndJaywalking and casinos]], none of which help your approval rating any.
* In ''VideoGame/SimCity 4: Rush Hour'', taking the "bad" missions nets you a lot of money but lowers your approval rating.