Although the Wall Street Journal Editorial Page made it abundantly clear that the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission was way off, giving PwC and other large accounting firms a hard time for their mandatory retirement age policies, the AICPA thought it would be prudent to make its thoughts on the matter known:
In a letter to members of the EEOC, the AICPA has expressed concern that a significant expansion of the Age Discrimination in Employment Act would be detrimental to the accounting profession and respectfully requested that the EEOC decline to continue on this path.In a June 25 letter from AICPA president and CEO Barry C. Melancon, the Institute wrote, “We do not dispute that hundreds of thousands of non-partner employees are appropriately covered by the ADEA. However, we believe that accounting firm partners (those who own and control a portion of each firm) are not covered by the ADEA, and we do not believe they should be under consideration, as the possible action contends. Our position is consistent with—and relies upon—longstanding EEOC policy that presumes that partners are not ‘employees’ for purposes of anti-discrimination laws. A change that treats accounting firm partners as ‘employees’ would upend the long-established expectations and business reliance interests of the accounting profession.”
Drop it now and they'll forget this ever happened; keep it up and maybe someone else will have to get involved.
