The new $100 bills was unveiled by the Treasury Department on Wednesday, complete with its anti-counterfeiting stripes, hidden images and copper bell.

The debut of the Ben Franklin bill gives me an excuse to write about professions that pay $100 an hour – or more – to their top practitioners.  I’m not talking about people who make $100 an hour once or twice a year. I mean those who earn $100 an hour for just about every hour they work.

That means they make around $200,000 a year – more if they win a bonus or take on extra consulting gigs, less if they take a six-week leave to explore India with their mother or daughter.  Some 3.9 million Americans earned $200,000 to $1 million a year in adjusted gross income, according to the Internal Revenue Service,  counting individuals and many dual income earning families. That means almost 9 percent of all  households — or at least those who filed tax returns — are bringing in a C-note an hour (though that includes investment and other taxable income).

My lists of occupations comes straight from the government, as will those cool new $100 bills. These are drawn from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics National Occupational Employment and Wage Estimates for May 2008, the most recent data available.

The first list is those professions that definitely have plenty of $100 an hour people, even though the job category’s average pay doesn’t approach that.

Definitely $100 and up jobs:

1. Surgeons,  average $207,000 or $99.41 an hour

2. Anesthesiologists,  $198,000

3. Orthodontists,   $195,000

4. Chief executives,  $160,000 or $77.13 an hour

5. Dentists,  $154,000

6. Natural sciences managers, $123,000 or $59.30 an hour

7. Lawyers, $124,000 or $53.17 an hour

The BLS also gives some details on people’s income if they’re in the 90th percentile of their occupation or if they work in a city where their skillsets are sought after. So engineering managers in San Jose earn more than their counterparts in any other city, while dentists in Anchorage get some of the highest paychecks.

Also on that list are a variety of other doctors – from obstetricians to internists to psychiatrists. Despite being in short supply for years, nurses don’t even come close – they average around $65,000 and the top 10 percent earn maybe $50 an hour or less.

My second list, also drawn from the BLS data, includes occupations where it seems very likely some people reap pay of $100 an hour, either for consulting or project work or where their tenure and value reaches its zenith. Besides the BLS data, I’m relying on my 20-plus years as a business writer or editor.

Here’s’ probably $100 an hour types,with their average income

1. Airline pilots, $119,700

2.  Securities broker / sales person  $92,000

3. Petroleum engineers  $119,000

4. Physicists  $106,000

5. Engineering managers, $121,000

6. Computer, information systems managers $119,000

7. Management consultants  N/A

9. Professors, law or medical $101,000 and $102,000

10. Producers and directors, $83,000

All the salary figures are average annual earnings, from the BLS. So while one producer earns $19,000 a year running a small town theater company part-time, another one earns $205,000 for some big New York troupe or movie production company.

So how can you bring up your earnings so those new $100 bills will show up more often in your wallet? That sounds like a good subject for another blog post sometime soon. Or maybe a series of posts. So if you have great ideas on adding to your earnings, please send them my way.

Meanwhile, check out the amazing BLS document that is the statistical source for this. It’s chock full of data on 800 occupations, including quite a few that don’t earn $100 a day and a handful that earn $100 an hour but only in some locations.  Dentists in Alaska, for example, earn the highest average wage – and average $97.30 an hour, or $203,000 a year.  Anesthesiologists in Maryland and Kentucky earn $103 an hour or more, and they earn still higher wages in New Jersey and Washington state, though the BLS tables don’t give specifics.

As for me, I’d be happy to earn $100 an hour for my writing -  and hope to achieve that some day and for more than a few days. Just don’t expect me to don a surgical gown or wear a power tie or move to Alaska to collect it.

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If you want to see more on the new $100 bills, which debut to the public in February, check out the New York Times Bucks blog, or a video showing all the security details  and some music that would be right at home on the 4th of July. My prefered paper, The Washington Post , ran the Associated Press account on the new big bill.

Skip lunches out or Starbucks on the way into the office to save some cash. The latest Harris Poll confirms it: More people are “brown bagging it” to cut costs.

The survey focuses on small ways Americans are saving money, by going to hair stylists or barber shops less frequently or buying refillable water bottles. The biggest way of saving: Almost two thirds of the 2,576 people surveyed say they’re buying more generic brand merchandise in the last six months.

One cutback though comes with substantial career concerns: We mean the 45 percent of Americans who stay in and eat peanut butter sandwiches or leftover spaghetti.  Make that 56 percent for Gen Xers, those ages 34-45. Clearly brown-bagging can bring real savings. If you spend even $5 or $6 a day for an affordable lunch out, you’re dropping $25 to $30 a week on meals. The adds up to $780 over six months on burgers and fries or veggie wraps and salads.

All that time, you may be insulated from important insights and information, as well as work friends. You could miss out on important gossip or details on changes coming in your department or organization. These are often shared outside the office – at lunch or over happy hours after work. Or you may miss out on new job possibilities, or start-ups or consulting gigs that could bring a second source of income.

So no matter how much we understand and embrace the new frugality, we also value camaraderie and celebrations – and those often happen over meals. Don’t risk damaging your reputation or developing one as a staid and unsociable sort over a few dollars.

In these tough times we cannot afford to become cut off from our work colleagues – both as a source of information and as supporters of our new projects, career goals or needs for personal development.

So if you’re one of the Americans who have been eating lunch at their desk – or sitting alone in a corner of the corporate cafeteria, a bit abashed by the boring brown bag, it’s time to break bread with your boss and coworkers.

Here’s five ways to be frugal and use food for professional fellowship:

• Plan an office party at your home. Come up with a reason for the gathering – sometimes a silly idea like your 1,000th day on the job or something serious like your best friend’s promotion or new baby. Then make sure you have all the food and drink organized before the event begins so you can concentrate on connecting with the crew.
• Get with the gang every other Friday. Your new scrimping and saving is laudable, but leave room for the occasional team gab fest in your favorite eatery or bar. Be smart and selective about when to show up – and make sure you have a sweet or smarmy answer to the “where have you been?” question.
• Create a souper star support group. This group is focused on frugality and career success. Heat up some soup – store bought or homemade – once a week or every other week and warm up your career prospects too. To take this beyond a chat and chew, look for career advancement articles or tools to share. Or ask each person to find one book that may be valuable to all and report on it. My current choice: The Power of Small / Why Little Things Make All the Difference by Linda Kaplan Thaler and Robin Koval (Broadway Books, $17.95, 140 pages).
• Start a bagels and bargains group. This also could also be called bagels and bravery  or bagels and balance – depending on your focus and hopes. The point is: Build your network – and your reputation for creativity and community. Be sure to share career insights along with money-saving ideas. Make sure you rotate the bagel buying, and get buy-in from your HR Department and boss.
• Produce a monthly or quarterly office potluck. These can be great fun – and great for business. They strengthen the camaraderie and connections, and give workers a chance to show off their culinary talents too. One consulting firm even created a friendly competition for the best dish from the worker’s ethnic background – and then published a cookbook from their entries. Your office might not want to take it that far, but a quarterly shared meal may mean the folks in accounting are more likely to share their expertise with sweetness. A potluck can be a great way to stage a brainstorming session, a sales meeting or a meet the new staffers gathering. And if you organize this, you’re at the nexis of information and people – and you’re seen as someone who understands motivating staff and being frugal with corporate expense accounts, both pluses for your next performance review.

Of course, there’s other ways to stay attuned to the news and gossip besides noshing on noodles. Coffee, salads, dessert, wine and cheese or an ice cream social – something I used a few summers ago for my team.

So engage your creativity along with your appetite for career information and connections.

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If you’re interested in reading more on Americans frugality, as documented by The Harris Poll, go here.

If you want some recipes for your first office potluck, I’ve appreciated several luscious dishes from Susan at  Farmgirl Fare . Or make the first one a recipe you received from Mom or Dad (even if they never posted anything on a blog, they feed us for years).