Profit Margin
3.9%
Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services ·NAICS 54
NAICS 54 · IRS SOI 2013 (C corp) · Census CBP 2023
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services - Industry Benchmarks
$107,141/yr average annual pay, with 37,881 SBA loans on record for NAICS 54.
- 3.9%
- Net margin
- 10.4M
- Workers employed
- $107,141/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $17.2B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated August 2026
The verdict · NAICS 54
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services runs a 3.9% pre-tax net margin - below the national median - across 989K establishments employing 10.4M workers.
- 3.9%
- Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI)
- 10.4M
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $107,141/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $17.2B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Use Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services's NAICS benchmark as a comparison point, not a forecast for one business.
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services 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 Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sits inside Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services at a 3.9% net margin (below the national median), $1.3T in aggregate receipts across 901,714 returns, averaging $1.4B per establishment.
989,182 establishments employ 10,401,442 workers (10.5/location) at $107,141/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by Texas and New York.
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services sits in the 68th percentile for employment and the 27th percentile for net margin among 2-digit NAICS industries with reported data.
Total Receipts
$1.3T
Annual revenue (IRS SOI)
Net Income
$49.5B
Pre-tax net income
Employment
10,401,442
Total employees (Census CBP)
Avg Payroll / Employee
$107,141/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
989,182
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 249,338; establishment count increased by 14,879. 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)Where each dollar of Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services revenue goes
Workforce scale
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services margin vs national reference points
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services net margin 13.0%
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
901,714 returns
Margin: 3.9% · Receipts: $1.3T
Partnership SOI 2022
291,255 returns
Margin: 22.9% · Receipts: $820.7B
S Corporation SOI 2017
10,641 returns
Margin: 5.3% · Receipts: $142.2B
Sole Proprietorship SOI 2022
3,917,083 returns
Margin: 41.0% · Receipts: $247.8B
Financial Detail
- Total Tax Returns Filed
- 901,714
- Avg Receipts per Business
- $1.4B
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $1.1T
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 10.5
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services NAICS 541 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 1,430,821 |
| Texas | 871,344 |
| New York | 696,537 |
| Florida | 614,527 |
| Virginia | 536,441 |
| Illinois | 467,150 |
| Pennsylvania | 378,845 |
| Massachusetts | 369,685 |
| New Jersey | 342,794 |
| Georgia | 326,724 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
37,881
Total Loan Volume
$17.2B
Avg Loan Size
$453K
Jobs Supported
313,294
Program Breakdown
7(a) 34,028 (90%)
504 3,853 (10%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
2,152 loans in this industry
New Business Share
19.8% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 4,358
2021 5,264
2022 4,928
2023 5,672
2024 7,603
2025 8,824
2026 1,232
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average revenue for Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services?
$1.3T in total annual receipts across all Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services businesses. Average per business: $1.4B.
How profitable is Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services?
3.9% net profit margin, below the national median.
How many businesses are in Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services?
989,182 business establishments. Together they employ 10,401,442 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services?
$107,141/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 10.5 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services employment?
California leads with 1,430,821 workers. Texas (871,344) and New York (696,537) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services receive?
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services businesses received 37,881 SBA loans totaling $17.2 billion between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $453K. These loans supported 313,294 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 Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services, both at NAICS level 2 and excluding this code so the neighborhoods are not self-links.
According to Census County Business Patterns 2023, Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services ranks #6 of 19 U.S. industries at the 2-digit NAICS level by total employment. According to IRS SOI 2013 IRS Statistics of Income, its reported pre-tax net margin ranks #11 of 15 at that same detail level.
Similar reported net margin
Nearest peer industries by ABS(IRS pre-tax margin) (3.9% here).
Similar workforce scale
Nearest peer industries by ABS(Census employment) (10,401,442 here).
Read with this industry: Understanding profit margins by industry · Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services · 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 54 · 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
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.