Employment
240,007
Total employees (Census CBP)
Wholesale Trade ·NAICS 42512
NAICS 42512 · IRS SOI (C corp) · Census CBP 2023
Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers - Industry Benchmarks
$71,674/yr average annual pay, with 609 SBA loans on record for NAICS 42512.
- 35K
- Establishments
- 240K
- Workers employed
- $71,674/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $356M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated August 2026
The verdict · NAICS 42512
California leads Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers activity nationally, across 35K establishments employing 240K workers. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level.
- 35K
- Business establishments (Census)
- 240K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $71,674/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $356M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Use Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers's NAICS benchmark as a comparison point, not a forecast for one business.
Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers is reported here with financial measures from IRS Statistics of Income and workforce measures from Census County Business Patterns. The page keeps those source systems distinct, shows unavailable fields rather than estimating them, and links the underlying industry context so readers can compare the same NAICS activity before interpreting a margin or payroll figure.
Source: IRS SOI (C corporation headline) and Census County Business Patterns 2023
Benchmarking Insights for Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers
Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers sits inside Wholesale Trade.
34,595 establishments employ 240,007 workers (6.9/location) at $71,674/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by Texas and Florida.
Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers sits in the 82nd percentile for employment among 5-digit NAICS industries with reported data.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$71,674/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
34,595
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment decreased by 4,879; establishment count decreased by 1,224. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Subscribe to this industry's release updates (RSS)Workforce scale
Financial Detail
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $17.2B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 6.9
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers NAICS 425120 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 28,408 |
| Texas | 25,055 |
| Florida | 16,200 |
| Illinois | 9,932 |
| Ohio | 9,610 |
| New York | 9,221 |
| Pennsylvania | 9,209 |
| North Carolina | 8,738 |
| Georgia | 8,086 |
| New Jersey | 7,333 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
609
Total Loan Volume
$356M
Avg Loan Size
$584K
Jobs Supported
3,584
Program Breakdown
7(a) 545 (89%)
504 64 (11%)
Top SBA Lender
Northeast Bank
44 loans in this industry
New Business Share
14.6% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 58
2021 76
2022 82
2023 90
2024 132
2025 152
2026 19
Frequently Asked Questions
How many businesses are in Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers?
34,595 business establishments. Together they employ 240,007 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers?
$71,674/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 6.9 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers employment?
California leads with 28,408 workers. Texas (25,055) and Florida (16,200) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers receive?
Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers businesses received 609 SBA loans totaling $356 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $584K. These loans supported 3,584 jobs at origination. Most lending (89%) came through the SBA 7(a) program.
Nationwide industries with similar benchmark drivers
Two IRS/Census peer sets for Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers, both at NAICS level 5 and excluding this code so the neighborhoods are not self-links.
According to Census County Business Patterns 2023, Wholesale Trade Agents and Brokers ranks #97 of 551 U.S. industries at the 5-digit NAICS level by total employment.
Similar workforce scale
Nearest peer industries by ABS(Census employment) (240,007 here).
Read with this industry: Industry employment trends · Wholesale Trade · 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 42512 · CBP 2023 · IRS SOI
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.