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Email this citationCIAO DATE: 04/05
The Future of the Accounting Profession
February 2004
Abstract
America is many things. At our core we are a commercial society. Our commercial society underwrites our prosperity. It is the basis not just for jobs and for wealth creation unparalleled in history, but more broadly it is a vehicle for consumer choice and upward mobility, the financier of our great cultural and educational institutions, and the basis for the income of a democratic government that has provided the world with its longest-lived constitution and history′s most open and free society.
American business is the source of 138 million jobs held by Americans. It is the source of the financial security of the 91 million Americans who are invested in stocks directly or through mutual funds or via employer sponsored retirement plans. It is the tax basis of every city and state as well as the federal government. It backs our currency, which is used to pay for over $1.5 trillion in imports every year, sustaining the global economy. It pays for the world′s defense and is the basis for the hard power that our Commander in Chief can unleash in the defense of freedom. It is also the basis of the soft power that America projects worldwide.
The bedrock of our commercial system is reliable accounting. Without high quality accounting standards, the lifeblood of capital cannot be efficiently allocated to its best use in building and sustaining our economy and our way of life. The integrity of capitalism depends on the integrity of our accounting system.
