The Federal Government, State and Local Governments (SLG), and Not-for-profit organizations (NFP) all have unique objectives and assets under their control. As a result it may not be feasible to develop a single set of accounting standards that accurately represents all of their financial activity in a manner that is useful to concerned parties. To resolve these discrepancies three separate standard setting bodies have been tasked with developing Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) for these different organizations: The Federal Accounting Standards Advisory Board (FASAB) for federal accounting, the Governmental Accounting Standards Board (GASB) for SLG, and the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) for NFPs. The different standards created by these organizations all achieve their goals with varying strengths and weaknesses.
Federal Government Accounting
FASAB faces many unique challenges when developing accounting standards for the federal government. The federal government's shear size, ability to manipulate the money supply, and complex issues such as accounting for social security all complicate the task of developing a single standard for representing the government's financial activity. In spite of these obstacles FASAB has managed to provide a standard requiring all agencies to provide similar reports, which can is then consolidated into an individual report. This allows the reader to analyze the whole as well as the contributions of the individual parts.
The greatest strength of FASAB, in my opinion, is its use of performance and accountability reports. These reports require federal organizations to provide logical outcome based metrics that measure the entities ability to achieve its desired effec...
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... no requirement for the Form-990 to be posted to an organizations website. To find an organizations Form-990 an interested party must search online for the tax form, which can be difficult if they do not know the organizations proper legal name or what address they claim for tax purposes.
Conclusion
The task of representing the financial activities and effectiveness of federal, SLG, and NFP can be complex given the distinct goals and resources of these entities. The capitalist nature of our society has historically placed greater emphasis on the accounting standards of businesses than those of the government and NFP organizations. As more attention begins to shift in our society on the ethics associated with accounting standards it is essential that we ensure that the organizations which set this policy and work toward social change be held to the same standard.
Ethics plays a vital role in developing accurate and high quality financial statements for management, financial institutions, and investors. As management utilizes financial statements to make decisions regarding the operations of the business, it is necessary to review accurate financial statements to make strategic decisions about the future of the organization. Investors and financial institutions require accurate financial statements to make informed decisions upon whether to invest funds into the organization or the wisdom of lending funds to said organization.
For instance, the profit making health organizations have the main intention of creating profits for the shareholders while the nonprofit organizations are created to further their mission (Knowing the Differences Between Nonprofit and For-Profit Accounting , 2015). Just the way these organizations differ in their purpose and foundation, they also differ in their accounting procedures. Their financial statements are presented in different ways. The financial statements prepared at the end of a year are also very different. The main reason for these differences is because the two organizations follow different accounting standards. In this part, I will lay an explicit focus on how the two organizations present the various items in the owners’ equity statement (Baker,
For example, since they are not organized to pursue profits, nonprofits are more worthy of trust and therefore more reliable. Moreover, nonprofit comprise vast and growing sector of the national economy, and they are a vital partner with government to provide a wide range of social and human services. The American public will continue to value and support the nonprofit sector as long as it satisfies recognized needs not addressed by government or the for-profit sector. During the years, nonprofits sector provided historically valued services that public and private sectors failed to provide, and promoted new ideas, theories and policies to society. And finally, effective and appropriate use of technology is critical to maintaining a nonprofit organization 's accountability and relevance. A nonprofit should manage information with regard for confidentiality, safety, accuracy, integrity, reliability, cost-effectiveness, and legal compliance. A nonprofit should take the opportunity in incorporating the appropriate technology into its work to improve its efficiency, efficacy, and accuracy in the achievement of its
The goal of the Codification is to simplify the organization of thousands of authoritative U.S. accounting pronouncements issued by multiple standard-setters. To achieve this goal, the FASB initiated a project to integrate and topically organize all relevant accounting pronouncements issued by the U.S. standard-setters including those of the FASB, the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA), and the Emerging Issues Task Force (EITF)
Throughout the past several years major corporate scandals have rocked the economy and hurt investor confidence. The largest bankruptcies in history have resulted from greedy executives that “cook the books” to gain the numbers they want. These scandals typically involve complex methods for misusing or misdirecting funds, overstating revenues, understating expenses, overstating the value of assets or underreporting of liabilities, sometimes with the cooperation of officials in other corporations (Medura 1-3). In response to the increasing number of scandals the US government amended the Sarbanes Oxley act of 2002 to mitigate these problems. Sarbanes Oxley has extensive regulations that hold the CEO and top executives responsible for the numbers they report but problems still occur. To ensure proper accounting standards have been used Sarbanes Oxley also requires that public companies be audited by accounting firms (Livingstone). The problem is that the accounting firms are also public companies that also have to look after their bottom line while still remaining objective with the corporations they audit. When an accounting firm is hired the company that hired them has the power in the relationship. When the company has the power they can bully the firm into doing what they tell them to do. The accounting firm then loses its objectivity and independence making their job ineffective and not accomplishing their goal of honest accounting (Gerard). Their have been 379 convictions of fraud to date, and 3 to 6 new cases opening per month. The problem has clearly not been solved (Ulinski).
The AICPA Code of Professional Conduct defines independence as consisting of independence of mind and independence in appearance. According to the AICPA Code of Conduct, Section 55 Article IV, An accountant member should maintain objectivity and be free of conflicts of interest in discharging professional responsibilities. Moreover, a member who practices their accounting work in a public firm should be independent in fact and appearance when providing auditing and other attestation services (aicpa.org). According to the case study What Lies Beneath, I think that Betty did not show her professional skepticism since she built trust on her client, which she could not have as an auditor. As an auditor,
Private and public accounting has long been discussed and disputed in regards to financial reporting. Since the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB) was created in 1973, accountants have called for different accounting regulations for private and public accounting sectors, as private companies do not have the resources to meet the complex requirements of public companies. Private companies currently are not required by law to issue annual or quarterly financial statements (James, 2012). Private companies do, however, have the option to apply the U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP), cash basis, or accrual accounting to their financial statements (James, 2012).
Accounting Theory: Conceptual Issues in a Political and Economic Environment (6th edition ed.). South Western College Pub.
Codes of ethics can be a form of self-regulation and accountability for NGOs and nonprofits. Even if codes are not implemented, it is suggested organizations create and abide by a mission statement and/or a set of goals. Codes originally developed as a means to help the public regain confidence after the scandals in the 1990’s, but have grown the most in recent years with the increase in organizations. From 2000 to 2011, the use of codes has increased from 16.6 percent to 55.8 percent. Not all codes are created equal, they vary in clarity, length, applicability, and jurisdiction. Some states with an abundance of nonprofits have state regulations and codes, for example the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits was created in 1994 and created the Principles and Practices for Nonprofit Excellence, a 20 page, detailed report encompassing fundraising, employee wages, internal hiring processes and more. On the other hand, the Massachusetts Council created a one-page code emphasizing six core values (Bromley & Orchard, 2016).
The aim of this paper is to provide the framework of the current professional accounting code of ethics. What are the ethics and how we define them? In this report we try to determine the main ethical principles that will establish the right and
The globalization of business has resulted in the need for compatible accounting standards that can be used internationally for financial reporting. As a result, the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) were developed by the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) to unify the various financial reporting methods and create a single accounting standard which can be applied to any financial statement worldwide (Byatt). The global standardization of financial reporting will increase the readability and enhance comparability of globally traded companies’ financial statements, without the need of conversion or translation. There are a few main differences between the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and the U.S. Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (U.S GAAP). The increasing recognition and acceptance of the International Financial Reporting Standards by accounting professionals in the United States, will affect the way in which the U.S will record financial statements in the future.
The International Accounting Standards Board, (IASB), began life as the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) in the 1973. The IASC was created in June 1973 as a result of an agreement by the accountancy bodies of Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom and Ireland and the United States. These countries constituted the Board of IASC at that time.
Financial reporting is an example of an ethical problem for an organization or business. Many busin...
According to business, or any organization, Accounting plays a major role in developing and growth of the business. Financial standards of the organization expected as the complexities of business growth and expansion. Hence determining the implementation of the standards can vary according to the type of industry, business or organization.
The revenue/cost period-: Revenue and the cost period in accounting that the company get income from normal business activities. It’s referred to normal business income that the company got by selling their product and service.