As a former 10 yr management consultant, working for the "two largest firms" in the globe, yes...they do hand out status to consultants (up to 1p level) and most of them earn above and beyond that.

However, there are a lot of GS's out there that don't work for the "big management consulting firms."

One additional "food for thought" around the requirement for GS status. With United not publishing the requirements for it, as I mentioned before they run the risk of people hitting that requirement level, then spending their travel on other airlines (i.e. SQ, NH, LH etc.) for the remainder of the year.

With this said, I think United has the GS program in part to keep business on UA for the people that fly both INTL (especially) and DOM. Think about it, if I can get 1K level flying on *A and get better service, (i.e. full fare on SQ, or NH) from others, the only motivation then to fly UA is the Elite bonus miles, CR-1's, BIS for MM level, e-500's vs attaining 1K status on flying *A across the pond.

The real question, (and this is good for another thread), is if someone who held GS level with UA and lost it to say...1K or lower, would they shift their high dollar INTL travel to *A carriers vs United?