3min chapter

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Accountants Blamed for Southwest Meltdown

The Accounting Podcast

CHAPTER

The AICPA Town Halls Are Not Listening to the Members.

Bob Greene says the AICPA is not listening to its members. He says they're ignoring data that they published about this problem. The chair of the A ICPA, Anu Pometa, said removing the fifth year would lower the bar for entry and create all these barriers among practicing among states. But nobody is saying that we should just do it in one state, right? We should do it everywhere., he writes.

00:00
Speaker 2
Let me get this going over here. When you're doing that, I just want to let you say the AICPA town halls might be the best thing the AICPA is currently doing. And they kind of came to this game a little bit. They've been consistent about it throughout there. There's actually good information.
Speaker 1
I guess, but also, I mean, they're messaging
Speaker 2
is what bothers you. Well, the thing
Speaker 1
is they're not listening to the members. The members are telling them this 150-hour rule is a problem. And the AICPA keeps saying, no, it's not. It's not enough just to have a podcast. You have to actually listen to the people who are listening to your show. And that's why we love to get listener feedback and we love to talk about it on the air. AICPA gets these people on their town halls saying, get rid of the 150-hour requirement. All they keep saying is no. And I think there's actually a real, I don't know what you call it, it's, they're just not looking at the data. They're ignoring the data that they published about this problem. And I want to play this clip for you. Let me see if I can share my screen here. All right. Now I'm just waiting for the video to render.
Speaker 3
So while
Speaker 1
I wait for the video to render, allow me to read the email because there's both an email and there's a appearance on the AICPA town hall. So here's the email from the chair of the AICPA. As you close out the year, you're no doubt reflecting on a challenging 2022 and anticipating what lies ahead. For many of you, recruiting and retaining highly qualified staff remains a top concern. Accounting, like many other professions, is facing talent shortages. Over the past several years, we've seen a trend of fewer young people entering the profession. Enrollment and higher education is in decline. College and exam-related costs are high. Many starting salaries at firms are too low. So they see the problem, right? This trend cannot continue. For our profession to survive, we must grow our student pipeline, and this means addressing multiple factors, including attractiveness, cost, time, and reward. And that's exactly what the AICPA and its partners aim to do. We all know there are no quick solutions to these issues, but the AICPA, together with stakeholders across the profession, is poised to tackle them. Some believe reducing educational requirements for initial licensure is a silver bullet. We fundamentally disagree. This action would come at a great cost, undermining the CPA license itself, and would not solve a very complicated problem. Lowering the bar for entry into the CPA profession in even one state would immediately introduce new barriers that would make it harder for CPAs to practice across state lines, physically or virtually. In addition, such a move undermines the hard-earned reputation of the CPA profession as an esteemed and trusted profession. This reputation we hold as CPAs is one of the reasons I came into the profession. Okay, so let's just stop there. The chair of the AICPA, Anu Pometa, is saying that removing the fifth year would lower the bar for entry and then create all these barriers among, like, practicing among states. But nobody is saying that we should just do it in one state, right? We should do it everywhere.

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