Scriptwriter rich list shows booming business

Author Chen Tong ranks second on the scriptwriter rich list, earning 16 million yuan ($2.6 million).

Only three of the list's scriptwriters write for movies. The rest mostly work in TV.

Zou Jingzhi, the screenwriter for Zhang Yimou's film Coming Home, came in ninth this year with 10 million yuan. Yu Baimei, the screenwriter for Fen Shou Da Shi (The Breakup Guru), ranked 19th.

More than a third of the writers on this year's list are older than 60.

Zhang Jia is the youngest at 28. She mostly writes family dramas and took 15th place.

The list reveals the popularity of TV series about war and family dramas.

Liu Heping, scriptwriter of Bei-ping Wu Zhanshi (All Quiet in Peking) - a 53-episode spy serial about espionage between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party before New China's 1949 founding - earned 13 million yuan and ranked sixth.

The China's Richest Writers List has been released annually since 2006. Last year was the first time it included the scriptwriter sub-list. The list is the brainchild of 30-year-old former journalist Wu Huaiyao, who founded his own company to promote reading and writing.