NAICS 524 · IRS SOI 2013 (C corp) · Census CBP 2023

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities - Industry Benchmarks

$98,628/yr average annual pay, with 5,200 SBA loans on record for NAICS 524.

4.3%
Net margin: 3.0M
Workers employed: $98,628/yr
Avg payroll / employee: $2.4B
SBA lending, FY20–26

Data updated August 2026

The verdict · NAICS 524

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities runs a 4.3% pre-tax net margin - below the national median - across 176K establishments employing 3.0M workers.

4.3%
Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI): 3.0M
Workers employed (Census CBP): $98,628/yr
Avg payroll / employee: $2.4B
SBA lending, FY20–26

Use Insurance Carriers and Related Activities's NAICS benchmark as a comparison point, not a forecast for one business.

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities 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 2013 (C corporation headline) and Census County Business Patterns 2023

Benchmarking Insights for Insurance Carriers and Related Activities

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities sits inside Finance and Insurance at a 4.3% net margin (below the national median), $2.4T in aggregate receipts across 123,819 returns, averaging $19.6B per establishment.

176,459 establishments employ 2,964,086 workers (16.8/location) at $98,628/yr average annual pay. Texas leads employment, followed by California and Florida.

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities sits in the 83rd percentile for employment and the 44th percentile for net margin among 3-digit NAICS industries with reported data.

Profit Margin

4.3%

Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)

Total Receipts

$2.4T

Annual revenue (IRS SOI)

Net Income

$104.9B

Pre-tax net income

Employment

2,964,086

Total employees (Census CBP)

Avg Payroll / Employee

$98,628/yr

Annual compensation

Establishments

176,459

Business locations

Release-over-release change

What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023

Employment increased by 97,501; establishment count decreased by 4,512. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.

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Where each dollar of Insurance Carriers and Related Activities revenue goes

Receipts decomposition, IRS Statistics of Income 2023 aggregate for Insurance Carriers and Related Activities

Workforce scale

Establishment size, Insurance Carriers and Related Activities (Census SUSB)

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities margin vs national reference points

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities net margin 14.4%

Cross-industry median (5%)

p25/median/p75 = 3%/5%/7%

Business Structure Breakdown

Per-entity IRS SOI tables at their own vintages, shares only when every row shares one year (never mix 2013/2017/2022 populations).

C Corporation SOI 2013

123,819 returns 100%

Margin: 4.3% · Receipts: $2.4T

Financial Detail

Total Tax Returns Filed: 123,819
Avg Receipts per Business: $19.6B
Annual Payroll (Total): $292.3B
Avg Employees per Establishment: 16.8

Sub-Industries

Industry	Profit Margin	Employment	Avg Payroll/Emp
Agencies, Brokerages, and Other Insurance Related Activities NAICS 5242	9.8%	1,310,504	$87,892/yr
Insurance Carriers NAICS 5241	4.8%	1,653,582	$107,137/yr

Top States by Employment

State	Employment	Establishments	Annual Payroll	Avg Payroll/Emp
Texas	270,629	15,618	$24.2B	$89,480/yr
California	236,503	17,742	$26.2B	$110,628/yr
Florida	233,532	15,478	$20.2B	$86,676/yr
Illinois	182,297	7,509	$16.2B	$88,664/yr
New York	164,125	8,434	$20.3B	$123,665/yr
Pennsylvania	143,132	6,478	$14.2B	$99,038/yr
Ohio	123,594	5,623	$11.4B	$92,119/yr
Georgia	96,530	6,075	$9.1B	$94,536/yr
New Jersey	92,225	3,692	$12.3B	$133,728/yr
Massachusetts	82,802	2,810	$10.3B	$124,060/yr

Showing top 10 of 51 states

SBA Lending Activity

SBA FY2020–2026

SBA Loans Approved

5,200

Total Loan Volume

$2.4B

Avg Loan Size

$470K

Jobs Supported

28,509

Program Breakdown

7(a) 4,668 (90%)

504 532 (10%)

Top SBA Lender

Live Oak Banking Company

385 loans in this industry

New Business Share

17.8% of borrowers were new/startup businesses

Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)

2020

791

2021

954

2022

774

2023

679

2024

849

2025

1,035

2026

118

View SBA lending rankings →

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the average revenue for Insurance Carriers and Related Activities?

$2.4T in total annual receipts across all Insurance Carriers and Related Activities businesses. Average per business: $19.6B.

How profitable is Insurance Carriers and Related Activities?

4.3% net profit margin, below the national median.

How many businesses are in Insurance Carriers and Related Activities?

176,459 business establishments. Together they employ 2,964,086 workers.

What is the average payroll per employee in Insurance Carriers and Related Activities?

$98,628/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 16.8 employees per establishment.

Which states have the most Insurance Carriers and Related Activities employment?

Texas leads with 270,629 workers. California (236,503) and Florida (233,532) round out the top three.

How much SBA lending does Insurance Carriers and Related Activities receive?

Insurance Carriers and Related Activities businesses received 5,200 SBA loans totaling $2.4 billion between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $470K. These loans supported 28,509 jobs at origination. Most lending (90%) came through the SBA 7(a) program.

Nationwide industries with similar benchmark drivers

Two IRS/Census peer sets for Insurance Carriers and Related Activities, both at NAICS level 3 and excluding this code so the neighborhoods are not self-links.

According to Census County Business Patterns 2023, Insurance Carriers and Related Activities ranks #13 of 77 U.S. industries at the 3-digit NAICS level by total employment. According to IRS SOI 2013 IRS Statistics of Income, its reported pre-tax net margin ranks #42 of 75 at that same detail level.

Similar reported net margin

Nearest peer industries by ABS(IRS pre-tax margin) (4.3% here).

Transportation Equipment Manufacturing 4.3% Specialty Trade Contractors 4.3% Leather and Allied Product Manufacturing 4.5%

Similar workforce scale

Nearest peer industries by ABS(Census employment) (2,964,086 here).

Credit Intermediation and Related Activities 2,953,663 Religious, Grantmaking, Civic, Professional, and Similar Organizations 2,676,522 Nursing and Residential Care Facilities 3,278,910

Read with this industry: Understanding profit margins by industry · Finance and Insurance · 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 524 · CBP 2023 · IRS SOI 2013

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 Accessed 2026-07-06

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.