The Profession of Accounting in the usa

In most organizations the accounting group is the largest staff unit, that is, the largest group other than the "line" activities of production and marketing. The accounting group consists essentially of two types of people: (1) bookkeepers and other data-entry employees who maintain the detailed operating records and (2) professional accountants who decide how items should be reported, prepare the reports, interpret these reports, prepare special analyses, design and operate the systems through which information flows, and ensure that the information is accurate.

In 1992 there were 1,365,000 accountants and 1,841,000 bookkeepers and accounting clerks in the United States.

All publicly owned companies and many other organizations have their accounting reports audited by a public accounting firm. These firms also perform other services for clients. Some of these firms are very large: the six largest (colloquially called the Big Six) each have tens of thousands of employees and hundreds of offices around the world, with annual revenues totaling billions of dollars. They are far larger than any law firm, medical group practice, or other professional firm. At the other extreme, thousands of public accountants practice as individuals. All told, in 1991 a total of 68,000 accounting and auditing firms employed about 525,000 people and generated $34 billion of revenues.

Most public accountants are licensed by their state and are designated as Certified Public Accountants (CPAs). The professional organization of CPAs is the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). Many accountants employed by industry belong to the Institute of Management Accountants (IMA). Many college and university accounting faculty members belong to the American Accounting Association (AAA).

Although accounting is a staff function performed by accounting professionals within an organization the ultimate responsibility for the generation of accounting information rests with management. Management's responsibility for accounting is the reason that one of the top officers of many businesses is the controller. Within the division of top management's duties, the controller is the person responsible for satisfying other manager's needs for management accounting information and for complying with the requirements of financial reporting. To these ends the controller's office employees accounting professionals in both management and financial accounting. These accountants design, install, and operate the information systems required to generate financial and managerial reports.

2. Sort out the functions listed below into two categories:

(1) those performed by bookkeepers (2) those performed by accountants

a. payment of invoices; b. calculation of all incoming and outgoing transactions; c. setting up and monitoring the procedures for dealing with the figures; d. the issuing of invoices for sales of the company’s products or services; e. dealing with non-routine situations where decisions have to be made about how and where to record special kinds of income or expenditure; f. providing information on cash flow; g. looking for ways to present company's figures in the most advantageous light with regard to tax liability; h. producing monthly and annual financial reports.

3. Give an overview of the system of jobs in the accounting profession in the Republic of Belarus. Do additional research into the issue if necessary.

Text 3

1. Read the text below and take notes of its contents.