No one panic, if you get licensed before 2014, you’re grandfathered in as substantially equivalent. So if you feel like procrastinating, don’t let us stop you but maybe keep the date in mind.
In addition to the new credit hour requirements, Ah-nuld also signed bills requiring mandatory peer review for CPA firms starting next year and requiring non-active CPAs to disclose their status. We thought those were both standard operating procedure but a couple more laws won’t hurt anything.
If you can’t bear the thought of 25-30 extra credit hours in college, move to Colorado, Puerto Rico, or the Virgin Islands as they’re the holdouts on the 150 credit-hour requirement.
California Adopts 150-Hour Rule [Web CPA]
Related Posts
Why IFRS is Similar to an Obscure Reality TV Program
Late on Friday we told you about the rager that the IFAC was throwing over the weekend in London and today we get the less than surprising news that they want the governments of the world to push for global accounting standards.
“According to IFAC, participants at the conference agreed that the public interest would best be served by a single set of high-quality, principles-based financial reporting and auditing standards for listed and public interest entities.”
The problem with this whole push for IFRS is that getting anyone to care about accounting rules is like trying to get men interested in the whole Jon & Kate Plus 8 drama. They’re completely clueless at first mention and when you attempt to get into the details interest is immediately lost.
Leading accountants tell governments quicken pace of global standards adoption [Accountancy Age]
Is the Era of Work/Life Balance Over?
Did it ever exist? We hope accounting firms have gotten their act together and don’t have to resort to more layoffs even though rumors still persist.
Whether the shooting is over or not, it’s a pretty sure bet that, at the very least, lots of you are doing the same amount of work with less people on your team. So any illusions you had about work/life balance before have progressed to full blown poppycock.
The question remains though, is your firm still pitching this as one of their “core rhetoric values” (insert respective buzzword)?
Continued, after the jump
Call us idealistic but it seems that with everything that has happened over the last 12-18 months, most firms would want to level with their employees. You know, give them the straight shit:
“Look, we’re really sorry but we’ve got to drop this whole work/life balance thing. We just can’t keep a straight face any more.”
It’s a very tricky situation that firms find themselves in since recruiting is in full swing. Painting the rosy picture for the recruits but leveling with current employees at the same time? Is this even possible?
What’s your firm’s latest message? Are they still encouraging the work/life balance or has slowly reached the “not applicable” stage? Did it ever exist for you at your firm or have you been deleting those emails since the day you walked in the door because you knew it was bupkis? Discuss in the comments.
The Government Accountability Office Does a Great Job, Says the Government Accountability Office
We don’t envy anyone working at the GAO. Telling Congress how badly they spend money and then telling the whole world about it (even though no one listens) sounds like a pretty thankless job.
So the fact that the GAO gave itself an “A” on its performance review shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone. Who else was going to the give them the performance review? Plus if you’re regularly known as the “Taxpayer’s Best Friend” then we think you can be trusted with the honor system.
In fiscal year 2009, GAO met or exceeded all of its performance targets by, for example, identifying $43 billion in financial benefits–a return of $80 for every dollar GAO spent–and over 1,300 improvements in laws and government programs and operations. The rate at which GAO’s recommendations were implemented by federal agencies or the Congress was 80 percent, and over two-thirds of the products issued contained recommendations. During fiscal year 2009, the GAO met or exceeded all of its performance targets and made recommendations that resulted in “over 1,300 improvements in laws and government programs and operations.
To be perfectly honest, that does sound pretty damn impressive. Trying to make any sense of the ins and outs of the federal government isn’t something that we would wish upon our worst enemy.
If you’re still skeptical of the GAO stellarness, you’ll be happy to know that it was recently ranked #2 in the best places to work in the federal government. Now before you dismiss this silver medal, this isn’t some hack job put out by Fortune; this is something that is only issued every two years, by the Partnership for Public Service. We’re not saying that it would be difficult to rank so high on such a list but it’s got to be worth something.
Summary of GAO’s Performance and Financial Information Fiscal Year 2009 [GAO.gov]
Best_Places_to_Work_2009