Employment
314,940
Total employees (Census CBP)
Construction ·NAICS 23731
NAICS 23731 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction - Industry Benchmarks
$98,566/yr average annual pay, with 576 SBA loans on record for NAICS 23731.
- 6.3%
- Construction sector margin
- 315K
- Workers employed
- $98,566/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $368M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 23731
Texas leads Highway, Street, and Bridge 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)
- 315K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $98,566/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $368M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction
Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction sits inside Construction, a sector that runs a 6.3% net margin overall.
9,256 establishments employ 314,940 workers (34.0/location) at $98,566/yr average annual pay. Texas leads employment, followed by California and Florida.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$98,566/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
9,256
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 7,993; establishment count increased by 54. 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)
- $31.0B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 34.0
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction NAICS 237310 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| Texas | 38,778 |
| California | 24,421 |
| Florida | 22,060 |
| Pennsylvania | 13,953 |
| North Carolina | 11,870 |
| Virginia | 10,749 |
| New York | 10,354 |
| Arizona | 9,387 |
| New Jersey | 8,990 |
| Colorado | 8,545 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
576
Total Loan Volume
$368M
Avg Loan Size
$639K
Jobs Supported
9,133
Program Breakdown
7(a) 520 (90%)
504 56 (10%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
53 loans in this industry
New Business Share
25.3% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 99
2021 85
2022 64
2023 71
2024 139
2025 107
2026 11
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 23731 level. Texas leads this industry nationally. The broader Construction sector runs a 6.3% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction?
9,256 business establishments. Together they employ 314,940 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction?
$98,566/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 34.0 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction employment?
Texas leads with 38,778 workers. California (24,421) and Florida (22,060) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction receive?
Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction businesses received 576 SBA loans totaling $368 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $639K. These loans supported 9,133 jobs at origination. Most lending (90%) 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 86% of that same 551-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 Highway, Street, and Bridge Construction
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Construction
- 9,256 establishments, 314,940 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 576 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 23731 · 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.