Essay about Accounting: Accountancy and Certified Public Accountants

Submitted By Jacob-Durham
Words: 544
Pages: 3
Open Document
Accounting is a glorious but misunderstood field. The popular view is that it's mostly mind-numbing number-crunching; it certainly has some of that, but it's also a rich intellectual pursuit with an abundance of compelling and controversial issues. Accountants are often stereotyped as soulless drones laboring listlessly in the bowels of corporate bureaucracies. But many accountants will tell you that it's people skills, not technical knowledge, that are crucial to their success. And although it's often thought of as a discipline of pinpoint exactitude with rigid rules, in practice accountants rely heavily on best estimates and educated guesses that require careful judgment and strong imagination.

Actually, stereotyping accounting and accountants, either positively or negatively, is useless because accounting involves so many different activities. The short-but-sweet description of accounting is "the language of business." A more formal definition is offered by The American Accounting Association: "The process of identifying, measuring and communicating economic information to permit informed judgments and decisions by users of the information."

However defined, accounting plays a vital role in facilitating all forms of economic activity in the private, public and nonprofit sectors, in endeavors ranging from coal mining to community theater to municipal finance.

The name that looms largest in early accounting history is Luca Pacioli, who in 1494 first described the system of double-entry bookkeeping used by Venetian merchants in his Summa de Arithmetica, Geometria, Proportioni et Proportionalita. Of course, businesses and governments had been recording business information long before the Venetians. But it was Pacioli who was the first to describe the system of debits and credits in journals and ledgers that is still the basis of today's accounting systems.

The industrial revolution spurred the need for more advanced cost accounting systems, and the development of corporations created much larger classes of external capital providers - shareowners and bondholders - who were not part of the firm's management but had a vital interest in its results. The rising public status of accountants helped to transform accounting into a profession, first in the United Kingdom and then in the United States. In 1887, thirty-one accountants
Show More

Related Documents: Essay about Accounting: Accountancy and Certified Public Accountants

Career Opportunities for B.S. Accountancy Students Essay

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Accountancy or Accounting is said to be the “language of business”. It is the art of communicating in terms of financial aspects in the business world. It communicates in the form of financial statements that shows the income, assets, expenses, liabilities and capital of a certain business. It is a branch of mathematical science that shows the reason behind the excellent success of a company, as well as its downfall or failure. Accountancy qualifies as a profession because…

Words 6096 - Pages 25

ACT Certification: The Accreditation Council For Accountancy And Taxation

is the Accreditation Council for Accountancy and Taxation. The Accreditation Council for Accountancy and Taxation is the regulatory and certification board for the Accredited Business Accountant (ABA). (Goodson, 2012) ACAT is proof that you have the knowledge and skills in the area of Accounting and Taxation. A person is giving their credentials if they can provide financial, accounting and taxation services. Professionals receive accreditation in accountancy and/or taxation through examination…

Words 717 - Pages 3

carreer presentation unit 2 work Essay

What is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA)? Annual Salary Range Full-time entry level: $50,000 to $60,000 Full-time with several years of progressive experience: $100,000+ The entry-level range will vary by industry, geographic location, and other factors. You can obtain more detailed information concerning starting salaries from the career services or placement office of the college or university that you plan to attend. Increases in annual salary will depend on your professional growth…

Words 2735 - Pages 11

Business Plan Essay

Etymology[edit] Both the words accounting and accountancy were in use in Great Britain by the mid-1800s, and are derived from the words accompting and accountantship used in the 18th century.[12] In Middle English (used roughly between the 12th and the late 15th century) the verb "to account" had the form accounten, which was derived from the Old French word aconter,[13] which is in turn related to the Vulgar Latin word computare, meaning "to reckon". The base of computare is putare, which "variously…

Words 1955 - Pages 8

Ethics in Accounting Essay

Ethics in accounting is of utmost importance to accounting professionals and those who rely on their services. Certified Public Accountants (CPAs) and other accounting professionals know that people who use their services, especially decision makers using financial statements, expect them to be highly competent, reliable, and objective. Those who work in the field of accounting must not only be well qualified but must also possess a high degree of professional integrity. A professional's good reputation…

Words 1140 - Pages 5

Ethics Essays

hiring, this is not proof audit of the company. Abreu, John D, another certified public accountant whose CPA license got suspended, and was permanently prohibited from performing audits. Mr. Abreu was involved in performing an audit of Western Sierra Medical Center for the year of 2004. Mr. Abreu failed to perform the audit in accordance with professional standards. Auditor's responsibility is to search and verify accounting records and to review other evidence. The main purpose of the audit of financial…

Words 1582 - Pages 7

Essay on Finman

------------------------------------------------- In Management accounting or managerial accounting, managers use the provisions of accounting information in order to better inform themselves before they decide matters within their organizations, which allows them to better manage and perform control functions ------------------------------------------------- Definition[edit] IFAC Definition of enterprise financial management embracing three broad areas: cost accounting; performance evaluation and analysis; planning…

Words 2582 - Pages 11

Sarbanes-Oxley Act Essay

publicly held companies and their audit firms-dramatically affects the accounting profession and impacts not just the largest accounting firms, but any CPA actively working as an auditor of, or for, a publicly traded company. The basic implications of the Act for accountants are summarized below. Public Company Accounting Oversight Board will Move to a different private sector regulatory structure, a new Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (the Board) will be appointed and overseen by the SEC…

Words 482 - Pages 2

CPA Assignment per1 Essay

Ms. Carpenter 92 points possible DUE December 5, 2014. Friday 1.What is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA)? (10 points) Certified Public Accountant (CPA) is the statuary title of qualified accountants in the United States who have passed the Uniform Certified Public Accountant Examination and have met additional state education and experience requirements for membership in their respective professional accounting bodies and certification as a CPA 2. What are the Three E’s when it comes to…

Words 550 - Pages 3

Acc541 Week 1

describe the accounting standards that are having to be followed and who is responsible for setting them. The reason for accounting standards to be in place is to ensure that the effectiveness of the information is properly implemented by the users. Understanding is pertinent to the organization, so that their objectives and their ethical responsibilities are being met by accountants. Therefore, this paper will review the standard-setting process, the authoritative sources of accounting information…

Words 1256 - Pages 6