Insurance Agency and Brokerage Revenue Benchmark

Average Insurance Agency Revenue per Year 2022 Economic Census

The 2022 Economic Census counts every insurance agency and brokerage with paid employees, from a local independent agency to the branch of a national broker, and publishes their combined annual receipts, which are mainly commissions and fees rather than premiums. Dividing that total by the number of agencies gives the average annual revenue per employer establishment shown below.

≈$1,418,000 /year

Average annual gross revenue per employer establishment

How this is calculated: about $194.3 billion in combined annual receipts divided by 137,034 employer establishments works out to an average annual revenue of $1,418,000 per employer establishment.

Scope: Insurance Agencies and Brokerages, NAICS 524210. The category covers agencies and brokerages that sell insurance policies on behalf of carriers, from independent local agencies to captive agents with paid staff. Insurance carriers, claims adjusters and third party administrators are counted in separate categories. Classified separately in group 5242: 524291 Claims Adjusting; 524292 Pharmacy Benefit Management and Other Third Party Administration of Insurance and Pension Funds; 524298 All Other Insurance Related Activities. Nothing outside that code is counted on this page.

Source US Census Bureau, 2022 Economic Census, Summary Statistics (ECNBASIC): ESTAB, RCPTOT and PAYANN by NAICS · Vintage 2022 Economic Census · Calculation BusinessNES · Accessed September 2026

Employer Establishments at Year Five Industry group

Agencies, brokerages, and other insurance related activities, NAICS 5242, the 2018 starting count compared with the count of five-year-old establishments in 2023.

Across the 2014 to 2018 cohorts, five-year results ranged from 55.7 to 58.4 percent. This benchmark covers Agencies, brokerages, and other insurance related activities, NAICS 5242, as a whole, and this category accounts for 137,034 of the 151,664 employer establishments in it. A count by age is not a survival rate, because the figures compare two headcounts rather than follow one set of businesses.

Payroll as a Share of Revenue Official data

Payroll divided by receipts, both as published for the same year.

Payroll share of receipts, Insurance Agencies and Brokerages, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

Approximately 34.0 percent of every revenue dollar goes to annual payroll, a substantial share because an agency sells the work of producers and account managers and has few other large costs beyond office space and technology.

Payroll here excludes benefits, employer taxes and owner compensation, and revenue here means commissions and fees, not the premiums collected on behalf of carriers, so the figure describes what the agency earns rather than what its clients pay.

Business Scale and Ownership Structure Official data

How large the average establishment is, and whether the population is independent operators or multi-site companies.

Scale and ownership, Insurance Agencies and Brokerages, United States, 2022 Economic Census.

The average establishment employed about 6.1 people, and the industry counted 1.1 employer establishments per firm. An agency of that size employs a few producers and service staff, and the establishments per firm figure shows a trade of mostly single-office agencies with brokerage networks and captive agency groups operating many locations alongside them.

These are arithmetic industry averages. They state the size of the average establishment and show that multi-establishment ownership exists. They do not show the distribution of business sizes and they do not measure market concentration.

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Data Source Notice

This product uses the Census Bureau Data API but is not endorsed or certified by the Census Bureau.

Figures above are from the 2022 Economic Census reference year, released by the Census Bureau in 2024 and 2025; markets have moved since.

Questions Worth Asking BusinessNES analysis

Insurance Agency and Brokerage: what a commission-based average leaves out.

Before you rely on this benchmark

• Independent agency or captive? Independent agencies place business with many carriers and own their book, while captive agents represent one carrier under its rules and compensation. Both appear here, and the difference shapes revenue, retention and what the agency is worth.
• How much of the revenue renews on its own? Commissions on renewing policies arrive year after year with limited new work, so a mature book produces recurring revenue that a new agency lacks. The share of renewal revenue is the core number of the trade and is invisible in the average.
• Personal lines or commercial? Personal auto and home policies bring many small commissions, while commercial accounts, benefits and specialty lines bring larger but more demanding ones. The line mix decides revenue per client and the expertise an agency needs.
• Do contingent commissions matter? Carriers pay some agencies additional compensation based on volume, growth or loss ratios, and that income can be a meaningful and volatile part of revenue. Its presence in a receipts figure depends on the agency's carrier relationships.
• What does the market cycle do to commissions? When premiums rise in a hard market, commission revenue rises with them without any change in policy count, and the reverse happens when rates soften. The census year reflects one point in that cycle.
• How are producers paid? Commission splits, salaries plus bonuses and contractor arrangements produce different payroll shares for the same revenue, and the owner's own book is often the main one. The structure behind the payroll figure varies from one agency to the next.