The bookkeeping profession is easy to guess about and hard to find real numbers for. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics is the authoritative source — it surveys employers directly — so every figure on this page comes from it, stamped with the survey period it belongs to.
The bookkeeping and accounting figures
The Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks two related occupations separately: bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks (code 43-3031), who record and reconcile transactions, and accountants and auditors (code 13-2011), who analyze and attest to financial statements. Wage figures are from the May 2024 Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics survey; the employment outlook is from the Occupational Outlook Handbook and covers 2024 to 2034.
| Metric | Figure | Source & period |
|---|---|---|
| Bookkeeping, accounting & auditing clerks — employment | About 1.6 million jobs | BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024 |
| Clerks — median annual wage | $49,210 | BLS OEWS, May 2024 |
| Clerks — lowest 10% earned | Less than $34,600 | BLS OEWS, May 2024 |
| Clerks — highest 10% earned | More than $72,660 | BLS OEWS, May 2024 |
| Clerks — projected employment change | Decline of 6% (2024–2034) | BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 |
| Clerks — projected annual openings | About 170,000 per year, on average | BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 |
| Accountants & auditors — median annual wage | $81,680 | BLS OEWS, May 2024 |
| Accountants & auditors — projected employment change | Growth of 5% (2024–2034) | BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 |
Statistics verified: July 2026 · re-verified quarterly against source
The two occupations move in opposite directions, and the reason is instructive. Clerk employment is projected to fall because software has automated much of the routine keying that once defined the role, while accountant and auditor employment is projected to grow slightly because analysis and attestation resist automation. The Bureau of Labor Statistics still projects roughly 170,000 clerk openings a year — almost entirely to replace people leaving the occupation — so the work does not vanish; it concentrates in the judgment that software cannot do.
What the numbers mean for your books
The projected decline in bookkeeping clerks is a statistic about data entry, not about the need for correct books. Software can import a bank feed; it cannot decide that a transfer was miscoded as income, notice that an account never reconciled, or trace an opening balance to its real home. That is precisely the work a cleanup does, and it is why automation has not made careful bookkeeping optional — if anything, it has made the review layer more valuable, because more raw data flows in with less human checking behind it.
So read these figures as context, not as a verdict on whether your books need attention. Whatever the profession's headcount does, the test for your own file is unchanged: does every account reconcile, does the balance sheet balance, and does the profit-and-loss read the way the business actually ran? A free review answers that for your file specifically, with no number invented along the way.
Want your own books checked against that test? Start with a free QuickBooks review, or read the reference docs behind the work.