Profit Margin
20.3%
Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)
Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services ·NAICS 5411
NAICS 5411 · IRS SOI 2023 · Census CBP
Legal Services - Industry Benchmarks
$120,985/yr average annual pay, with 4,514 SBA loans on record for NAICS 5411.
- 20.3%
- Net margin
- 1.2M
- Workers employed
- $120,985/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $2.0B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated July 2026
The verdict · NAICS 5411
Legal Services runs a 20.3% pre-tax net margin - well above the national average - across 181K establishments employing 1.2M workers.
- 20.3%
- Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI)
- 1.2M
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $120,985/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $2.0B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Benchmarking Insights for Legal Services
Legal Services sits inside Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services at a 20.3% net margin (well above the national average), $147.6B in aggregate receipts across 439,322 returns, averaging $336.0M per establishment.
181,092 establishments employ 1,190,297 workers (6.6/location) at $120,985/yr average annual pay. California leads employment, followed by New York and Florida.
Total Receipts
$147.6B
Annual revenue (IRS SOI)
Net Income
$29.9B
Pre-tax net income
Employment
1,190,297
Total employees (Census CBP)
Avg Payroll / Employee
$120,985/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
181,092
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 6,704; establishment count decreased by 849. This comparison uses two published national Census County Business Patterns releases; suppressed fields are omitted rather than estimated.
Where each dollar of Legal Services revenue goes
Workforce scale
Legal Services margin vs national reference points
Legal Services net margin 67.6%
Cross-industry median (5%)
p25/median/p75 = 3%/5%/8%
Business Structure Breakdown
How businesses in this industry are legally structured (IRS SOI)
C Corporation
120,096 returns 27%
Margin: 10.4% · Receipts: $106.8B
Sole Proprietorship
319,226 returns 73%
Margin: 46.1% · Receipts: $40.9B
Financial Detail
- Total Tax Returns Filed
- 439,322
- Avg Receipts per Business
- $336.0M
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $144.0B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 6.6
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Offices of Lawyers NAICS 54111 | N/A |
| Other Legal Services NAICS 54119 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| California | 157,775 |
| New York | 120,764 |
| Florida | 106,351 |
| Texas | 98,453 |
| Illinois | 55,015 |
| Pennsylvania | 47,444 |
| Georgia | 37,716 |
| New Jersey | 35,247 |
| District of Columbia | 31,599 |
| Ohio | 30,698 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
4,514
Total Loan Volume
$2.0B
Avg Loan Size
$434K
Jobs Supported
26,986
Program Breakdown
7(a) 3,501 (78%)
504 1,013 (22%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
205 loans in this industry
New Business Share
18.8% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 595
2021 791
2022 710
2023 644
2024 814
2025 827
2026 133
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average revenue for Legal Services?
$147.6B in total annual receipts across all Legal Services businesses. Average per business: $336.0M.
How profitable is Legal Services?
20.3% net profit margin, well above the national average.
How many businesses are in Legal Services?
181,092 business establishments. Together they employ 1,190,297 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Legal Services?
$120,985/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 6.6 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Legal Services employment?
California leads with 157,775 workers. New York (120,764) and Florida (106,351) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Legal Services receive?
Legal Services businesses received 4,514 SBA loans totaling $2.0 billion between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $434K. These loans supported 26,986 jobs at origination. Most lending (78%) 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: Legal Services reports a higher net margin than 95% of the 126 IRS-tracked industries at the same NAICS detail level. Its Census employment total exceeds 90% of that same 259-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 reported net margins
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported IRS pre-tax margin.
Closest workforce scale
Same NAICS detail level, ordered by the smallest difference in reported Census employment.
- Clothing Stores 1,190,123
- General Freight Trucking 1,185,495
- Elementary and Secondary Schools 1,176,824
Benchmarking Legal Services
- Net margin: 20.3% vs sector. Browse Professional, Scientific, and Technical Services
- 181,092 establishments, 1,190,297 workers. Payroll benchmarks
- 4,514 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 5411 · 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.