October Payrolls Crushed Forecasts, and Consultants Are Cashing In

The U.S. economy added 165,000 jobs in October, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported Friday, blowing past the 59,000 economists polled by Dow Jones had forecast. The headline number was a shock. The details underneath it were stranger still.

Management, scientific and technical consultants added 17,300 jobs between September and October, their biggest one-month jump in nearly two years. That single slice drove 25% of all gains in the professional and business services sector, and the group has grown by more than 45,000 over the past year, pushing its headcount past 1.9 million for the first time on record.

It marks a turn for an industry that had been stuck since 2023. Investors bet AI would gut demand for consultants: Gartner has shed more than half its value over three years, Accenture is down about 18% and FTI Consulting roughly 9%, even as the S&P 500 climbed some 74%. Gartner now projects worldwide AI spending will reach $2.7 trillion in 2026, up nearly 50% year over year. "The AI buildout and corporate interests to increase utilization will keep the technical consultants employed," said Jeffrey Roach, chief economist at LPL Financial, who called the sector a bright spot "worth watching" and likened it to the late-1990s scramble to implement internet tech.

Moody's Analytics estimates AI has created a net 786,000 jobs since ChatGPT launched in November 2022, partly on the back of data center construction. "Wasn't AI supposed to destroy jobs? The most dystopian scenarios even called for mass unemployment," chief economist Mark Zandi wrote in a social media post Monday. "That risk hasn't gone away, and AI-driven productivity gains could still shift into a higher gear. But for now, AI is adding to job growth, not subtracting from it."

Temporary help was the other engine, adding 18,600 positions, one of its biggest monthly gains since 2022 and 27% of the sector's total. Headcount is up about 3% since December, back to levels last seen in April 2025 — the month President Donald Trump's steep tariff rollout spooked corporate America. Economists treat temp hiring as a leading indicator, though the looming holiday season muddies the read. Couriers and messengers, a holiday-demand barometer, accounted for just over one in 10 new jobs. That category "bears watching for reversal in the months ahead," said Jason Pride, chief of investment strategy and research at Glenmede.

Political organizations may have chipped in too. BLS data shows election-year staffing tends to peak in October, and payrolls grew ahead of both the 2018 and 2022 midterms. This cycle's campaign war chests are bigger than ever: OpenSecrets expects the 2026 congressional election to be the most expensive midterm on record, with billions funding door knocking and phone banking that shows up as paid work.