Employment
835,631
Total employees (Census CBP)
Information ·NAICS 51731
NAICS 51731 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers - Industry Benchmarks
$91,850/yr average annual pay, with 91 SBA loans on record for NAICS 51731.
- 9.1%
- Information sector margin
- 836K
- Workers employed
- $91,850/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $87M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 51731
Texas leads Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers activity nationally. IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at this NAICS level, but the broader Information sector runs a 9.1% net margin.
- 9.1%
- Information sector margin (IRS SOI)
- 836K
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $91,850/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $87M
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers
Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers sits inside Information, a sector that runs a 9.1% net margin overall.
52,887 establishments employ 835,631 workers (15.8/location) at $91,850/yr average annual pay. Texas leads employment, followed by Florida and New York.
Avg Payroll / Employee
$91,850/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
52,887
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment decreased by 28,667; establishment count decreased by 1,669. 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)
- $76.8B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 15.8
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Wired Telecommunications Carriers NAICS 517311 | N/A |
| Wireless Telecommunications Carriers (except Satellite) NAICS 517312 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| Texas | 89,943 |
| Florida | 55,274 |
| New York | 48,911 |
| New Jersey | 28,116 |
| Washington | 21,904 |
| Arizona | 13,152 |
| Maryland | 12,398 |
| Massachusetts | 12,009 |
| Oklahoma | 11,857 |
| Utah | 9,480 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
91
Total Loan Volume
$87M
Avg Loan Size
$960K
Jobs Supported
2,097
Program Breakdown
7(a) 87 (96%)
504 4 (4%)
Top SBA Lender
Live Oak Banking Company
17 loans in this industry
New Business Share
16.5% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (4 yrs)
2020 35
2021 44
2022 9
2023 3
Frequently Asked Questions
How profitable is Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers?
IRS SOI doesn't publish margin data at the NAICS 51731 level. Texas leads this industry nationally. The broader Information sector runs a 9.1% net margin (IRS SOI 2023).
How many businesses are in Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers?
52,887 business establishments. Together they employ 835,631 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers?
$91,850/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 15.8 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers employment?
Texas leads with 89,943 workers. Florida (55,274) and New York (48,911) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers receive?
Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers businesses received 91 SBA loans totaling $87 million between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $960K. These loans supported 2,097 jobs at origination. Most lending (96%) 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 93% 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 Wired and Wireless Telecommunications Carriers
- No margin data, check the parent industry. Browse Information
- 52,887 establishments, 835,631 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 91 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 51731 · 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.