Profit Margin
3.4%
Net income ÷ total receipts (IRS SOI)
Health Care and Social Assistance ·NAICS 624
NAICS 624 · IRS SOI 2013 (C corp) · Census CBP 2023
Social Assistance - Industry Benchmarks
$33,470/yr average annual pay, with 8,664 SBA loans on record for NAICS 624.
- 3.4%
- Net margin
- 3.7M
- Workers employed
- $33,470/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $6.7B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Data updated August 2026
The verdict · NAICS 624
Social Assistance runs a 3.4% pre-tax net margin - below the national median - across 199K establishments employing 3.7M workers.
- 3.4%
- Pre-tax net margin (IRS SOI)
- 3.7M
- Workers employed (Census CBP)
- $33,470/yr
- Avg payroll / employee
- $6.7B
- SBA lending, FY20–26
Use Social Assistance's NAICS benchmark as a comparison point, not a forecast for one business.
Social Assistance 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 Social Assistance
Social Assistance sits inside Health Care and Social Assistance at a 3.4% net margin (below the national median), $114.3B in aggregate receipts across 70,108 returns, averaging $1.6B per establishment.
199,242 establishments employ 3,742,670 workers (18.8/location) at $33,470/yr average annual pay. New York leads employment, followed by California and Texas.
Social Assistance sits in the 88th percentile for employment and the 28th percentile for net margin among 3-digit NAICS industries with reported data.
Total Receipts
$114.3B
Annual revenue (IRS SOI)
Net Income
$3.9B
Pre-tax net income
Employment
3,742,670
Total employees (Census CBP)
Avg Payroll / Employee
$33,470/yr
Annual compensation
Establishments
199,242
Business locations
Release-over-release change
What changed from Census CBP 2022 to 2023
Employment increased by 321,228; establishment count increased by 3,962. 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 Social Assistance revenue goes
Workforce scale
Social Assistance margin vs national reference points
Social Assistance net margin 11.2%
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
70,108 returns
Margin: 3.4% · Receipts: $114.3B
Sole Proprietorship SOI 2022
821,655 returns
Margin: 38.1% · Receipts: $25.1B
Financial Detail
- Total Tax Returns Filed
- 70,108
- Avg Receipts per Business
- $1.6B
- Annual Payroll (Total)
- $125.3B
- Avg Employees per Establishment
- 18.8
Sub-Industries
| Industry | Profit Margin |
|---|---|
| Child Day Care Services NAICS 6244 | N/A |
| Community Food and Housing, and Emergency and Other Relief Services NAICS 6242 | N/A |
| Individual and Family Services NAICS 6241 | N/A |
| Vocational Rehabilitation Services NAICS 6243 | N/A |
Top States by Employment
| State | Employment |
|---|---|
| New York | 456,801 |
| California | 388,602 |
| Texas | 289,565 |
| Pennsylvania | 238,056 |
| Illinois | 184,338 |
| Florida | 144,522 |
| Ohio | 126,140 |
| New Jersey | 104,565 |
| Massachusetts | 102,064 |
| Minnesota | 101,619 |
Showing top 10 of 51 states
SBA Lending Activity
SBA FY2020–2026SBA Loans Approved
8,664
Total Loan Volume
$6.7B
Avg Loan Size
$768K
Jobs Supported
159,364
Program Breakdown
7(a) 7,083 (82%)
504 1,581 (18%)
Top SBA Lender
The Huntington National Bank
561 loans in this industry
New Business Share
37.1% of borrowers were new/startup businesses
Annual Lending Trend (7 yrs)
2020 980
2021 1,289
2022 1,203
2023 1,375
2024 1,682
2025 1,855
2026 280
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the average revenue for Social Assistance?
$114.3B in total annual receipts across all Social Assistance businesses. Average per business: $1.6B.
How profitable is Social Assistance?
3.4% net profit margin, below the national median.
How many businesses are in Social Assistance?
199,242 business establishments. Together they employ 3,742,670 workers.
What is the average payroll per employee in Social Assistance?
$33,470/yr average annual pay per employee. Businesses average 18.8 employees per establishment.
Which states have the most Social Assistance employment?
New York leads with 456,801 workers. California (388,602) and Texas (289,565) round out the top three.
How much SBA lending does Social Assistance receive?
Social Assistance businesses received 8,664 SBA loans totaling $6.7 billion between FY2020 and FY2026. The average loan size was $768K. These loans supported 159,364 jobs at origination. Most lending (82%) came through the SBA 7(a) program.
Nationwide industries with similar benchmark drivers
Two IRS/Census peer sets for Social Assistance, both at NAICS level 3 and excluding this code so the neighborhoods are not self-links.
According to Census County Business Patterns 2023, Social Assistance ranks #9 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 #54 of 75 at that same detail level.
Similar reported net margin
Nearest peer industries by ABS(IRS pre-tax margin) (3.4% here).
Similar workforce scale
Nearest peer industries by ABS(Census employment) (3,742,670 here).
Read with this industry: Understanding profit margins by industry · Health Care and Social Assistance · 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 624 · 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.