Employment
13,933
Total employees (Census CBP)
Transportation and Warehousing ·NAICS 48831
NAICS 48831 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Port and Harbor Operations - Industry Benchmarks
$76,503/yr average annual pay, with 11 SBA loans on record for NAICS 48831.
- 6.0%
- Transportation and Warehousing sector margin
- 14K
- Workers employed
- $76,503/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $10M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 48831
New Jersey leads Port and Harbor Operations activity nationally. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level, but the broader Transportation and Warehousing sector runs a 6.0% net margin.
- 6.0%
- Transportation and Warehousing sector margin (IRS SOI)
- 14K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $76,503/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $10M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Port and Harbor Operations
Port and Harbor Operations sits inside Transportation and Warehousing, a sector that runs a 6.0% net margin overall.
326 establishments employ 13,933 workers (42.7/location) at $76,503/yr average annual pay. New Jersey leads employment, followed by Florida and Maryland.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$76,503/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
326
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 606; establishment count decreased by 20. 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)
- $1.1B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 42.7
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Port and Harbor Operations NAICS 488310 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| New Jersey | 1,567 |
| Florida | 1,434 |
| Maryland | 1,321 |
| Washington | 269 |
| Illinois | 72 |
| South Carolina | 69 |
| Oregon | 23 |
| Minnesota | 16 |
Showing top 10 of 29 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
11
Total Loan Volume
$10M
Avg Loan Size
$948K
Jobs Supported
140
Program Breakdown
7(a) 10 (91%)
504 1 (9%)
Top SBA Lender
Mission Valley Bank
2 loans in this industry
New Business Share
18.2% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (5 yrs)
2020 2
2021 2
2022 2
2024 2
2025 3
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Port and Harbor Operations?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 48831 level. New Jersey leads this industry nationally. The broader Transportation and Warehousing sector runs a 6.0% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Port and Harbor Operations?
326 business establishments. Together they employ 13,933 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Port and Harbor Operations?
$76,503/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 42.7 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Port and Harbor Operations employment?
New Jersey leads with 1,567 workers. Florida (1,434) and Maryland (1,321) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Port and Harbor Operations receive?
Port and Harbor Operations businesses received 11 SBA loans totaling $10 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $948K. These loans supported 140 jobs at origination. Most lending (91%) 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 13% 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.
- Industrial Design Services 14,360
- Textile and Fabric Finishing Mills 14,366
- Broadwoven Fabric Mills 13,276
Benchmarking Port and Harbor Operations
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Transportation and Warehousing
- 326 establishments, 13,933 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 11 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 48831 · 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.