<p>“Yea bearcats, 55k is really peanuts for a 23 year old, +5k sign in bonus, +5k cpa bonus. I’m sure they gave you full benefits”</p>
<p>almost every investment banks give their interns full benefit…so sure they did…</p>
<p>@ Johnny Vue - the Big 4 do not pay overtime.</p>
<p>Of course they don’t, but you should know that most accounting salaried jobs expect you do overtime especially at the big 4. 40 hours work week is unheard of in the accounting industry - that is why you need to take the opportunity cost into consideration. With that, you’d probably be making a starting adjusted salary of $45+. </p>
<p>Its better to be a garbage collector or a police officer in NY. NYPD officers make $46k starting salary before overtime and it increases to $76k+ after 5.5 years or 90k with all the benefits (according to their website)! </p>
<p>Unless accounting is your passion, it is not a satisfying well-paying field to be in IMO.</p>
<p>Hmmm. I respect police officers and firefighters, they risk their life, so they deserve to be paid higher. As far as garbage collector, I respect them too. But I wouldn’t want my kid take that job even it pays more. Maybe at $200K, then I’ll advise him/her to sub-contract the job to somebody else.</p>
<p>Not sure how to respond to you Johnny Vue. Yes, you are worked to the bone at a Big 4 firm with lots of overtime, however, you exit opportunities open many doors with very respectable salaries. Also, with regional and mid-sized accounting firms you have a high earning potential with less OT than at a Big 4. Like a_mom said, those careers you listed are respectable, but compare in no way to the earning potential in accounting.</p>
<p>You can earn $200k+ by starting out as a police officer and moving your way up. The earnings potential is like any other career path.</p>
<p>Compared to the rate Universities are churning out accounting/business graduates, very few get a job at the big 4, yet alone, work in public accounting. If you are not top, it’s better to expect a starting salary of $30-40K. The people who get the best treatment at the big 4 are those engineers with industry specific knowledge, not accountants.</p>
<p>SOX may have increased demand for accountants, temporarily making the field ‘glamorous’, but IFRS is going to decrease demand in the future.</p>
<p>Jonny Vue notes,“You can earn $200k+ by starting out as a police officer and moving your way up. The earnings potential is like any other career path.”</p>
<p>Response: You also have one other perk as a police officer: You can die! I don’t know any accountants who are killed in the line of duty. I guess if putting your life on the line every day is worth an extra $50,000 or so, go for it.</p>
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<p>I don’t know what you’ve read, but as far as I know, accounting has always been a rapidly growing field. SOX helped it out even more, but accountants have always been desired. The credit crunch we are facing means that there are going to be even more regulations put in place (accountants are going to be needed to check on those), and Obama taxing the rich to death means more are going to seek the aid of accountants, and increasing intricacies in tax means that more tax accountants are going to be needed as well.</p>
<p>Secondly, I disagree with your statement about accounting being seen as “glamorous”. If you look on almost any thread, you’ll find someone saying accountants are bean-counters, that it’s not as interesting as finance and doesn’t pay as well, etc. I don’t know how you can say that the job is deemed glamorous. Plus, the fact that it’s one of the more difficult business majors means that supply will always be a bit lower than easier majors like Marketing or in most cases, Finance even.</p>
<p>Finally, yes, it’s true there are a good amount of accounting majors and not of all of them make it with the Big 4, but what is with people acting as if making the Big 4 is the only way to be successful? Government jobs can pay quite well (up to 150k from what I hear) with incredible benefits and relatively low stress, Regional partners usually make 200k or so, etc. As one poster said, the exit opportunities are much better as an accountant than most other professions, aside from investment banking or something like that, so I don’t see how comparing starting salaries of a police officer is a fair way of deeming that path more lucrative in the long-run.</p>
<p>or you could die of karoshi working in accounting…</p>
<p>I don’t know where policies are headed, but I do know supply and demand. I know that if standards become global, salary will eventually fall relative to inflation and more jobs might be outsourced to less expensive places around the world.</p>
<p>I worked two years auditing for the government and at a private firm. In that time, all I did was interact with CEO’s and executives. In that sense, it was glamorous. Accounting might be hard to some, but it is so easy to get into (just go to your local community college). Furthermore, you have to ask what you get out of it. In my case, as well as many others, less than 10% of what you will learn in accounting will be used in your job.</p>
<p>Having never been in auditing at a public accounting firm, this my not be correct. I hear that auditing for Big4 requires a ton of travel. If that is the case, what advantage would there be to outsource auditing positions just to fly everyone back to audit?</p>
<p>As for losing jobs, don’t expect things to be that different under IFRS. European countries that adopt IFRS tend to place there own interpretation on standards since IFRS is principle based. Even though they call it IFRS, there is still a great deal of variation between country meaning each would need its own accountants with said rules.</p>
<p>johnny vue: First, you cannot become a CPA by going to community college. Second, I recall having this conversation with you on another thread now and how irrational your thoughts were on the matter (I recall you stating the only jobs you could find were 30-40K jobs off of craigslist). Third, of course you learn more on the job. That is not unique to accounting. The degree shows you have the smarts to do it and helps you understand the basic foundation of the skills you will need. Please stop stating mis-information on here; there are many students looking for answers/knowledge about the profession.</p>
<p>Misinformation? You can go to CC to earn credits in order to sit on the CPA exam where I live. This CC offers upper level accounting classes not the intro ones. And it is a lot cheaper too. You pay $1300+ per class at a public university vs $300 at this CC.</p>
<p>[url=<a href=“http://www.mvc.dcccd.edu/accounting/default.aspx]Link[/url”>http://www.mvc.dcccd.edu/accounting/default.aspx]Link[/url</a>]</p>
<p>You might want to recruit students into accounting giving the impression that it is well paying, in demand job, etc… I am telling them what it is like after they get out. I don’t represent everyone.</p>
<p>Majority of community college don’t offer upper accounting classes. So give advise to a general audience to take credits in CC to sit for CPA exam is misleading. It would help if you note, in your area, there is this particular option. Now you did.</p>
<p>@ Johnny Vue - You are correct in that you can take the accounting courses at your CC you listed. However, the CC site even recognizes that you must first posses a bachelors degree from a University listed on Texas’ state board of accountancy, THEN, you can take the accounting courses a the CC. So you still need the 4 yr degree anyway.</p>
<p>Don’t listen to Johnny, he doesn’t know anything about accounting.</p>
<p>I don’t recall saying that a bachelors wasn’t required (all I said was that you can go to CC to be eligible to sit for the CPA), but if I did then my bad…I talk about the CC in my area…Don’t know about other cities…</p>
<p>Looks like the CC posted above offers all the courses needed to fulfill 30 hrs of accounting AND 24 hrs of business to sit for the CPA… accounting is so easy to get into…</p>
<p>Johnny you are such a ■■■■■. It is so blatantly obvious. At least try to be more discrete about it.</p>
<p>I’d love for you to walk into a firm and apply for a job with only CC accounting classes.</p>
<p>For many companies its the CPA designation that matters. In fact, they’d probably be more interested if you have depth and scope in another discipline.</p>