The Level Index, by trade
Electrical contractor financial benchmarks
The honest benchmark for electrical contractors, built from citable public sources. Electrician wages come from BLS, margin brackets from public electrical-contractor filings (IES Holdings), and the reality-check from CFMA. Level layers its blended contractor data on top.
20.3%
Gross margin (field)
IES C&I segment, FY2025; consolidated 25.5% blends in manufacturing
$62,350
Median electrician wage
BLS OEWS, SOC 47-2111, May 2024
6.3%
Net margin (before tax)
all-contractor 2023 financials, CFMA 2024; Best in Class ~11.9%
742,580
Electricians employed
US, one of the largest trades (BLS)
The nuance most 'electrical margin' numbers miss
IES segment margins differ; field installation is not one homogeneous segment.
IES FY2025 (September year-end) reported C&I 20.3% gross, Communications installation 23.2% gross and Infrastructure Solutions manufacturing 34.4% gross. Residential gross is not shown here. Operating margins are Residential 8.0%, C&I 11.0%, Communications 14.6% and Infrastructure Solutions 23.8%. At EMCOR, construction operating margins exceed mixed Building Services. Segment ordering is company-specific, not a universal field-versus-manufacturing rule.
Separate electrical end market, scope, complete direct cost and working-capital timing. The filing does not prove that moving from project work to service improves your margin.
Source: IES Holdings FY2025 10-K
How to read this: Level research pools HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection. Roofing and general contracting are outside that pool. The sources below are selected for relevance to electrical contractors; some are proxies or all-contractor references (SEC filings, BLS, CFMA, industry research), each tagged by confidence tier. Level's research below combines those trades. Some older figures have not been checked again against their original sources. Each value explains the time period, businesses included and what was measured.
IES reports different segment economics: manufacturing, communications installation, commercial contracting and residential contracting.
IES Holdings operating margin by segment, FY2025
Source / sample: IES Holdings FY2025 10-K segment operating margin
IES FY2025 reports C&I at 20.3% gross and 11.0% operating, Communications installation at 23.2% gross and 14.6% operating, Residential at 8.0% operating, and Infrastructure Solutions manufacturing at 34.4% gross and 23.8% operating. Its fiscal year ends in September. Gross and operating are different definitions; the consolidated margin is not a commercial-contracting benchmark.
Source: IES Holdings FY2025 10-K
Retained directional electrical references put service above bid projects; the filing does not isolate that split.
Illustrative gross-margin inputs by job type (not a measured cohort)
Source / sample: Directional: AceWatt, RunClockwork (2026)
Retained electrical planning ranges are 50-65% for residential service and 20-35% for bid project work, not verified cohort percentiles. IES manufacturing-versus-contracting data does not establish a service-versus-project premium. Trace complete direct cost, customer scope and paid-hour basis before applying any range.
Source: AceWatt, RunClockwork 2026 (directional)
The 2024 electrician wage reference runs about $19 to $51 an hour within SOC 47-2111.
Electrician hourly wage percentiles (BLS OEWS, May 2024)
Source / sample: BLS OEWS May 2024, SOC 47-2111; estimated employment 742,580, not survey sample size
Employee wages, not loaded cost. P90 is about 2.7 times P10 within this occupation; electrician helpers are a separate BLS occupation, so this is not a master-versus-helper comparison. Calculate payroll taxes, workers' compensation, benefits and paid nonbillable time from your records.
Source: BLS Occupational Employment & Wage Statistics, May 2024, SOC 47-2111
Electrical benchmarks, by source
5 source-verified rows (Tier A to E)Expand all 5 source-verified electrical benchmark rowsEvery metric is tagged by confidence level, from Tier A through Tier E, with direct SEC filing, BLS wage, and CFMA source links.
Public electrical field-contracting gross margin
Tier A~20%
IES Holdings (IESC) Commercial & Industrial segment 20.3% FY2025. The consolidated 25.5% is above C&I 20.3% partly because it includes Infrastructure Solutions manufacturing (34.4% gross) and Communications field/network installation (23.2% gross). Residential gross margin is not shown here; no four-segment gross ranking is established.
Source: SEC 10-K filing (IESC)
Electrician median wage (SOC 47-2111)
Tier A$62,350/yr
Median hourly $29.98; 10th pct $39,430, 90th $106,030. One of the largest construction trades by headcount.
Source: BLS OEWS, May 2024
Diversified MEP operating margin (EMCOR)
Tier Aoperating ~10%
EMCOR consolidated operating margin 10.1%, FY2025, includes a separately reported UK-sale gain contributing 85 basis points. Diversified mechanical/electrical and other work; not recurring operating margin alone.
Source: SEC 10-K filing (EME) FY2025
All-contractor net profit before tax
Tier B6.3% (Best in Class ~11.9%)
Historical 2023 financials, reported in the 2024 edition (1,290 valid financial respondents). The 11.9% reference is the Best in Class group, top 25% ranked on performance metrics, not the 75th percentile of net margin or a healthy-firm threshold.
Source: CFMA 2024 Construction Financial Benchmarker (n=1,290)
Job-level gross margin spread, all trades
Tier E44.3% median, P25 28.4% (job-weighted)
Measured across 1,747,089 completed jobs, all trades pooled rather than electrical-specific. Pooled across trades; within-company and between-trade spreads are not separately measured.
Tier A = stated public-company SEC or BLS observations; verify the exact period and scope. Tier B = trade-association survey or research-firm report (CFMA, IBISWorld). Tier C = industry publications or planning references, directional only. Tier D = Level calculations from filing inputs. Tier E = Level pooled research. Public-company figures describe large operators, not typical private firms or attainable upper bounds. Where sources conflict, both are shown, never averaged.
What the public electrical contractors actually earn
IES consolidated 25.5% gross margin includes commercial, residential and communications contracting alongside manufacturing. Match each segment definition instead of applying the consolidated blend to a private electrical shop.
| Company / scope | Gross | Operating | Net | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| IES Holdings (IESC)Commercial & Industrial segment, FY2025 | 20.3% | 11.0% | n/d | Commercial electrical contracting; Residential operating margin is lower, and Residential gross margin is not shown. |
| IES Holdings (IESC)Communications segment, FY2025 | 23.2% | 14.6% | n/d | Data-center / network install, riding data-center demand. |
| IES Holdings (IESC)Infrastructure Solutions segment, FY2025 | 34.4% | 23.8% | n/d | NOT field electrical: engineered power products / switchgear MANUFACTURING. |
| EMCOR (EME)US Electrical Construction segment, FY2025 | n/d | 12.1% | n/d | Large diversified electrical construction arm. |
n/d = not disclosed at that cut. IES segment operating margins exclude ~$52M unallocated corporate SG&A, so they slightly overstate fully-loaded segment profitability. Gross margins still require the issuer's cost definition; this does not certify that every private shop includes the same costs.
The Level lens: cost-completeness scenario (fictional)
Fictional electrical service call: a 50% incomplete contribution estimate becomes 28% after three separately identified costs.
Illustrative cost-completeness bridge, percentage of revenue
Source / sample: Fictional scenario; assumed cost percentages, not a measured cohort
Illustrative assumptions on $100 of revenue: an initial incomplete contribution estimate of $50, then separately omitted costs of $11, $6 and $5, leaving $28. This is not measured gross or net margin. Check your ledger before each adjustment: subtract only cost missing from the starting estimate. Fully burdened direct labor already included in gross profit must not be subtracted again. Allocate shared overhead once, distinguish economic contribution from financial-statement margin, and do not treat a rounded scenario as a trade benchmark.
Public-company anchors used
IES Holdings (IESC), EMCOR (EME). These are large, publicly traded operators. Filing observations and Level calculations labeled Tier D are separately scoped reference points, not a stand-in for a typical private electrical shop, which runs on different economics.
Level's pooled contractor references
These are pooled references from Level's 2,242-contractor research universe, with a separate eligible sample for each metric. Trade variation is not measured here. The pool covers HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection; it has no roofing or GC segment. Match your definitions and work mix before comparing.
Expand all 4 pooled cross-trade contractor reference metrics (n=2,242 universe)Includes blended gross margin, net profit, labor share, AR days, and cash reserve references across mechanical and specialty trades.
n=464 (blended). Cash collected divided by billed revenue across the six-trade pool; top decile 96.0%. The benchmark window is not published. Timing, credits and write-offs need separate reconciliation.
n=733 total; post-completion subset count not published (blended). 1 day with progress billing included; 7 days among post-completion invoicers. Subset and bottom-decile populations are not separately counted.
n=794 (blended). On decided quotes; 38.1% across all quotes.
n=1,747,089 jobs / 1,791 companies (blended). Blended across trades. Compare only jobs where revenue and direct costs are assigned to the same job.
How AI performs on Electrical subcontractor cutoffs, WIP schedules & AP checks (LevelBench-100)Why raw AI chatbots miss Monday-to-Friday subcontractor proration and unbilled WIP, and how Level Playbooks from 2,200+ past experiences prevent bad QuickBooks entries.
Electrical contractors comparing their QuickBooks profit margin against industry benchmarks often discover that cash-basis exports and unassisted AI tools distort job-cost gross margin. In LevelBench-100 (v3.0) (38 models and setups tested across 100 binary checks), unassisted models scored 31.0% to 71.0% and repeatedly failed on three electrical contracting close controls:
- Electrical Subcontractor Business-Day Proration (WF06): In the LevelBench-100 Capstone Electrical Subcontractors test ($9,000.00 bill spanning 14 calendar days but 10 Monday-to-Friday business days: 4 workdays in September and 6 workdays in October), unassisted models prorated on calendar days or expensed all $9,000.00 in a single month instead of accruing the exact 4/10 business-day share ($3,600.00).
- Unbilled Commercial WIP vs. Unsigned CRM Options & Deposits (WF06): Leaving $28,500.00 of completed September field work unbilled while booking $19,000.00 of upfront customer deposits for November work or unsigned CRM estimate options as current-month income. Use Level's WIP Calculator to check your cutoff gap.
- Supply-House Walk-In COD vs. Open AP Bills & Paper Checks (WF01 & WF02): Confusing walk-in counter debit purchases with open Accounts Payable bills, double-counting ACH/wire bill payments in COGS, or guessing categories on $20,200.00 of paper checks without check images.
AI paired with Level Playbooks (built from 2,200+ past SMB experiences) and operator review scores 100.0% accuracy and a 0.0% bad book-entry rate across all 100 checks, enforcing business-day WIP cutoffs and reconciling QuickBooks subledgers before closing the month.
Frequently asked questions (5)Answers on electrical contractor profit margins, data sources, and safe QuickBooks automation.
What is a good profit margin for an electrical contractor?
It depends on whether you mean gross or net, and on commercial vs residential work. The best hard reference points are public-company actuals: Public electrical field-contracting gross margin: ~20%. IES Holdings (IESC) Commercial & Industrial segment 20.3% FY2025. The consolidated 25.5% is above C&I 20.3% partly because it includes Infrastructure Solutions manufacturing (34.4% gross) and Communications field/network installation (23.2% gross). Residential gross margin is not shown here; no four-segment gross ranking is established. This is a scoped reference, not a measured distribution of private electrical firms.. The retained CFMA 2024 Benchmarker (2023 financials, 1,290 valid financial respondents) reports 6.3% net income before tax for all respondents and 11.9% for its Best in Class group, the top 25% ranked by performance metrics rather than a net-margin percentile. These are historical all-contractor references, not a measured electrical-only cohort or a current target. Small private shops vary widely, so use the tiered sources on this page rather than a single number.
Where does this electrical benchmark data come from?
Named sources selected for relevance to electrical contractors, including separately labeled proxies and all-contractor references: public-company SEC 10-K filings, BLS wage data, CFMA's Construction Financial Benchmarker, and industry research, each tagged by confidence tier with a source link. Level's pooled research covers HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection; it excludes roofing and general contractors. It includes electrical operators among these segments, but Level does not publish a separately measured electrical-only cohort. Collection, billing and quote metrics are pooled cross-trade references; the broader 2,200+ research universe is not the contributing sample for each metric.
Why do unassisted AI models misstate electrical contractor profit margins on QuickBooks exports?
Electrical contractors manage multi-week commercial progress billing, supply-house vendor bills, and cross-period subcontractor invoices. In LevelBench-100 v3.0 (38 AI models and setups evaluated across 100 binary accounting checks), all 27 unassisted foundation models scored between 31.0% and 71.0% accuracy and posted a 14.3% to 57.1% bad book-entry rate because they prorated a $9,000 electrical subcontractor invoice on calendar days instead of Monday-Friday business days (WF06, where 4 of 10 business days = $3,600 belonged in September), recognized unsigned CRM estimate options or omitted $28,500 in completed-but-unbilled September WIP, or confused walk-in COD debit purchases with open supply-house AP bills (WF02). Pairing AI with Level Playbooks (built from 2,200+ past SMB experiences) and operator review achieves 100.0% accuracy and a 0.0% bad book-entry rate.
Is electrical service work higher margin than project work?
Directional references suggest service/project differences, but no filing here isolates that comparison. Reconcile loaded direct labor, parts, callbacks and scope for matched job types before deciding whether a service mix change improves contribution.
Why is IES Holdings' margin higher than a normal electrical contractor's?
Because IES is not just an electrical contractor. Its highest-margin segment, Infrastructure Solutions at 34.4% gross, is engineered power-products and switchgear manufacturing plus data-center power infrastructure, not field electrical contracting. The segment that actually resembles a commercial electrical subcontractor, Commercial & Industrial, sits at 20.3% gross. Read the segment, not the consolidated blend.
Tier A and B rows name their source and link the record or source index where available. The full tiered dataset for all six trades (public-company actuals, BLS wages, CFMA and market figures, each with its source URL) is downloadable and free to cite with attribution. Download the per-trade benchmark facts (JSON).
See where your electrical numbers land
We pull your margin, labor economics, and collections and compare your matched-scope figures with public references and the pooled Level Index, with each sample identified, then show you the first leak to fix.
No commitment. Real numbers, not generic advice.