Employment
627,151
Total employees (Census CBP)
Construction ·NAICS 2371
NAICS 2371 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Utility System Construction - Industry Benchmarks
$87,180/yr average annual pay, with 877 SBA loans on record for NAICS 2371.
- 6.3%
- Construction sector margin
- 627K
- Workers employed
- $87,180/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $490M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 2371
Texas leads Utility System Construction activity nationally. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level, but the broader Construction sector runs a 6.3% net margin.
- 6.3%
- Construction sector margin (IRS SOI)
- 627K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $87,180/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $490M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Utility System Construction
Utility System Construction sits inside Construction, a sector that runs a 6.3% net margin overall.
20,109 establishments employ 627,151 workers (31.2/location) at $87,180/yr average annual pay. Texas leads employment, followed by California and Florida.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$87,180/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
20,109
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 27,005; establishment count increased by 388. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Workforce scale
Financial Detail
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $54.7B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 31.2
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Oil and Gas Pipeline and Related Structures Construction NAICS 23712 | N/A |
| Power and Communication Line and Related Structures Construction NAICS 23713 | N/A |
| Water and Sewer Line and Related Structures Construction NAICS 23711 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| Texas | 126,977 |
| California | 46,240 |
| Florida | 29,819 |
| Pennsylvania | 18,701 |
| Minnesota | 18,568 |
| Illinois | 16,406 |
| Ohio | 15,679 |
| Georgia | 14,165 |
| Arizona | 13,638 |
| New York | 13,582 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
877
Total Loan Volume
$490M
Avg Loan Size
$558K
Jobs Supported
12,204
Program Breakdown
7(a) 813 (93%)
504 64 (7%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
90 loans in this industry
New Business Share
32.5% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 107
2021 130
2022 101
2023 144
2024 185
2025 196
2026 14
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Utility System Construction?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 2371 level. Texas leads this industry nationally. The broader Construction sector runs a 6.3% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Utility System Construction?
20,109 business establishments. Together they employ 627,151 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Utility System Construction?
$87,180/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 31.2 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Utility System Construction employment?
Texas leads with 126,977 workers. California (46,240) and Florida (29,819) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Utility System Construction receive?
Utility System Construction businesses received 877 SBA loans totaling $490 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $558K. These loans supported 12,204 jobs at origination. Most lending (93%) came through the SBA 7(a) program.
Comparable industry benchmarks
These links are calculated from the current national dataset. They are comparison paths, not recommendations or evidence that businesses operate alike.
How this ranks: Its Census employment total exceeds 78% of that same 259-industry cohort. Calculated by ranking this industry's reported value against every other industry at the same NAICS digit-level, not the whole dataset: comparing a 6-digit detail industry to a 2-digit sector would mix incompatible scales.
Closest workforce scale
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported Census employment.
Benchmarking Utility System Construction
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Construction
- 20,109 establishments, 627,151 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 877 SBA loans on record. SBA lending rankings
Disclaimer: Public IRS/Census data, not financial or tax advice. See our full disclaimer.
Sources: IRS Statistics of Income (SOI) Business Tax Statistics · Census Bureau County Business Patterns 2023
NAICS 2371 · Data year: 2023
According to the U.S. Census Bureau, which released its 2023 County Business Patterns dataset in June 2025, PlainBizBench benchmarks 2,002 U.S. industries against Internal Revenue Service Statistics of Income data. See our methodology for the full compilation process.
Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.
Source: U.S. Census Bureau, County Business Patterns / SUSB Industry employment scale, payroll, and firm-size benchmarks · 2023
Every figure on PlainBizBench is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page aggregates profit-margin, payroll, entity-type, and SBA-lending benchmarks for this industry, live from the dataset. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error.
Disclaimer: Public IRS/Census data, not financial or tax advice. See our full disclaimer.