hiring in the management consulting sector slows, but remains positive. tax & accounting sector shrinks workforce.
by 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research
the professional services industry is accelerating a quiet but consequential reshaping toward higher-end advisory services and away from low-end compliance work.
ask 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 a.i.: where do accountants go when they quit?
consulting firms have added more than 27,000 jobs over the past 12 months, pushing total headcount to 1.56 million. in contrast, the accounting, bookkeeping, and payroll sector remains stuck near 1.155 million employees, a plateau that has persisted for much of the past three years, according to a new analysis by 卡塔尔世界杯常规比赛时间 research.
the diverging trajectories reflect how two of the profession’s most closely related sectors are adapting to post-pandemic economic realities. consulting firms are growing their headcount, albeit at a slowing pace, to meet rising demand for strategic advice in areas like digital transformation and esg. accounting firms, particularly cpa firms, are offering substantial pay increases to keep their staff. but, on average, the tax and accounting business has largely stopped increasing headcounts.
corporate boards and c-suite executives are apparently turning to consultants not just for cost-cutting, but for navigating entirely new business models, building teams with specialized skills at a pace accounting simply isn’t matching.
cpa offices hold steady as bookkeeping struggles and payroll surges
the tax, accounting, payroll, bookkeeping, and cpa firms are splintering in job growth and wage increases.
cpa offices, often viewed as the backbone of professional accounting, are largely holding their ground. employment is growing at an annualized rate of 4.9%, well above the 0.4% gain over last year at this time. average pay raises are moderating, slowing to about 4.8% from an annualized surge of more than 12% last month, with current pay rates at about $45.96 per hour.
cpa firms are clearly investing in highly credentialed talent to keep pace with client demand. the figures reflect a growing divide between compliance?oriented clerical work and advisory?driven roles. the bookkeeper labor market remains soft, while cpa firms compete aggressively for experienced professionals.
if the trend continues, higher?skill segments like cpa offices will likely keep pulling away from the rest of the sector, widening the pay gap between credentialed and non?credentialed workers.
bookkeeping employment is edging upward at an annualized rate of about 4%, but is still down about 1% from a year ago, a sign that clerical roles are continuing to disappear as firms automate routine functions. wages for bookkeepers are suddenly surging at an annualized rate of 8.8%, hitting $26.64 per hour, but remain only 2.1% about year-ago.
payroll services are seeing the most dramatic shift. employment is up by 4.1% from a year ago, even as it shows signs of cooling. paychecks for payroll workers are ticking up at an annualized rate of 3.4%, to $29.04 hourly. still, that’s only 1.1% more than year ago, suggesting steady but restrained wage growth in a sector that remains vital for companies despite new software?driven efficiencies.
consulting climbs. accounting goes negative.
management consulting firms are expanding by an annualized rate of 3.6%, while tax and accounting firms are shedding jobs at a 1.2% annualized rate, dipping into negative territory for the first time since the pandemic. for management consulting, it marks nearly three years of uninterrupted growth and a new record high. consulting wages are holding steady month-to-month, averaging $50.72 per hour, and up from $48.60 18 months ago, reflecting heightened competition for high-skill talent.
average weekly hours for consulting employees slipped slightly to 34.5, indicating that firms are moderating workloads after an unusually busy first half of the year. payroll indexes confirm the softening, with aggregate consulting payrolls dipping to an index value of 108.2, down fractionally from a month ago. this is the first back-to-back decline since early 2023.
accounting: higher wages, flat hiring
in accounting in general, headcounts are barely budging, with only 600 net new jobs monthly, bringing the sector to 1.155 million employees, effectively unchanged from a year ago.
the industry is relying instead on wage growth to keep its workforce in place. the average hourly earnings for accounting employees is now $44.14, 6.6% higher than a year ago. to be sure, the biggest wage jump was observed between mid-2022 and mid-2024, when pay rose by more than $3. meanwhile, aggregate payrolls have grown 11% since mid-2022, even as total employment now stays flat.
the wage escalation apparently reflects firms’ urgency to keep their existing talent. with fewer new cpas entering the profession, competitive compensation has become essential.
a tale of two strategies
consulting’s growth is being fueled by demand for services that didn’t exist five years ago, such as ai strategy, cybersecurity, and climate risk consulting. consultants are broadening their offerings beyond traditional management advice, creating new career paths for professionals with data science, policy, and technology backgrounds.
accounting firms are facing different pressures. bookkeeping and payroll roles are being automated, while compliance work is increasingly handled by software or outsourcing. as a result, accounting firms are consolidating staff and focusing compensation on high-margin advisory roles.
this bifurcation between accounting and consulting suggests two distinct responses to macroeconomic pressures. consulting is investing in specialized labor for expansion, while accounting is prioritizing retention and wage growth to safeguard institutional knowledge.
implications for the labor market
the contrast is stark for job seekers. entry-level positions in accounting are shrinking, while consulting offers a wider range of roles for graduates in data analytics and emerging technologies. for employers, the challenge is balancing cost pressures with retaining skilled labor.
if current trends hold, consulting could surpass 1.58 million jobs by the end of the year. accounting, by contrast, may remain mired near 1.155 million unless tax and regulatory changes spur a fresh wave of demand for compliance services.
the trendlines underscore how consulting maintains steady growth while payroll pressures trim its aggregate compensation. accounting, by contrast, is flatlining in employment but surging in wages, leading to a slow but steady rise in payrolls.
with tax season approaching and corporate clients recalibrating budgets, the coming quarters will test whether accounting’s wage-driven strategy can hold and whether consulting can regain its early-year growth pace.
policymakers may also face increasing pressure to address the new cpa pipeline, which still lags demand.
for now, the message for accounting to compete in professional services is to invest in talent — whether through expansion into new specialties or by paying a premium to keep the professionals they already have.