Believe it or not, some professionals are thriving during the recession … and CPAs are among them.

That's according to Sageworks, a Raleigh, N.C., outfit that provides CPA firms, banks and private companies with financial-analysis tools.

A recent Sageworks report found seven groups that have grown substantially in the past year. Among them are CPAs.

“The average revenue at accounting firms grew 10.2 percent in the past year,” the Baltimore Business Journal reports, “making the accounting industry among the top 20 sectors in the country by sales growth.”

Makes sense to me. In an economic environment as volatile as this one, the need for people who are fluent in the language of business is greater than ever.

But don't take my word for it. We've written before about predictions that auditors will be among the first folks to get stimulus-related jobs, which only makes sense. I mean, someone has to make sure the money is being spent on shoring up the economy.

If you're curious, the other six industries on the recessionary rise are:

• Vehicle maintenance. People aren't buying new cars, so they're trying to run their old cars as long as possible.
  
• Home remodeling. Same story as with cars. Nobody's buying new, so they're putting their money into improving their current homes.
  
• Food stores. Eating out is out. Eating in is in.
  
• Specialty schools. “In 24 months, technical and trade schools had top-line revenue growth of 7.8 percent, up from 5.9 percent in 2007,” the BBJ reports. Why pay for it when you can do it yourself, right?
  
• Dentists. Must be all of those new cases of teeth-grinding.
  
• Personal-care services like skin-care specialists, nail salons and hair salons. And why? Heck, why not? The economy looks like crap, but that doesn't mean we have to, right?