<p>I just wanted to add that majoring in accounting will teach you a lot more than simply financial statement preparation. Accountants usually have to take statistics, calculus, marketing, management, economics, finance etc. They get a broad swath of business topics because they really need to know these things for their job. In fact, to my knowledge, accounting provides a broader swath of business training than that of any other business major in my humble opinion.</p>
<p>Although I am not against folks majoring in engineering,which could also be useful, it is something that you really need to like. In fact, I don’t feel that either engeering or acounting is necessarily the better options for jobs. They are two very diverse jobs requiring very diverse skills and offering different opportunities.
I do, however, personally believe that accounting provides the best overall opportunity and job security for jobs in businesses ovet that of most other business majors. </p>
<p>Just for the record, from a job placement perspective,in addition to accounting, I also like acturarial studies (sp) and engineering, and hard science, and even math. All of these are in-demand today.</p>
<p>Originally Posted by gobluecpa
“The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax.” — Albert Einstein </p>
<p>“I can only assume that he’s talking about the fact that it was levied, not the process of calculating it.”</p>
<p>see, this is my point. for a scientist as sophisticated as einstein, there is no calculating process too hard to understand. however, that’s not what accounting is all about. the language of business also entails concepts that are law based. the broad perspective of business can sometimes confuse the most intelligent scientists, especially when it’s policy-oriented.</p>
<p>I’ll agree that engineering is one of the best things you can major in (provided you aren’t seeking a license in another field, such as accounting or pharmacy), but something like finance is much more of a useful science that teaches you plenty of skills and critical thinking that you wouldn’t get with something like art history or gender studies.</p>
<p>I will also agree that if you want to work as engineer, have a background in engineering, or work for an industrial or technology firm (even in a business capacity, such as CEO) then an engineering degree is probably best. However, if you know you would want to work somewhere like the big 4 or providing financial services, then you might as well study business.</p>
<p>The argument that engineering fanatics like to use against business is that there are more fortune 500 CEOs with engineering degrees, but this is completely irrelevant. Most fortune 500 companies deal a great deal, if not entirely with industrial functions or technology and it only makes sense that someone with an engineering background should manage such a firm. Business majors are more represented as CEOs of industrial companies than engineering majors among partners at accounting firms. If you were to look at this same statistic compared to the percentage of people who currently have a degree in business versus engineering, there may very well be more business major CEOs. Either way, using this data as an argument against business isn’t very well thought-out.</p>
<p>It’s one thing to say engineering is the most practical major for someone who has no idea what they want to do. However, telling someone to major in engineering as a route to business would really not be the best advice. Besides, the arguments suggesting business is a useless major are usually even more applicable to most other majors.</p>
<p>Dawgie notes,“He is a little too biased to accounting.”
Response: I am really not.I do not believe nor have I ever believed that accounting is the only major that provides strong job prospects and a secure future. Certainly, the majors that I noted in post 21 can be good too.</p>
<p>As my post #21 shows, I really do like other areas such as engineering and hard science, geology and even criminal/ forensic studies. Hey, I even started out majoring in physics; thus, I must have liked the subject. </p>
<p>Although accounting can provide some great opportunities ( especially if you don’t attend an ivy or semi ivy school), I would be the first to say that accounting isn’t the only great opportunity around. I only started the “Everything you wanted to know about accounting thread” because there was a pervasive trend here on CC that only math, science/ engineering, and economics are the" only real majors for jobs." I wanted to simply provide a counterpoint to that belief. .</p>
<p>Thanks again for the responses, this is turning out to be a very informative source of information, despite all your conflicted beliefs. :)</p>
<p>I’ve been doing a little research on my own and I have noticed that many of the top executives do have engineering degrees. However, I haven’t done much in engineering, and don’t have much interest in it.</p>
<p>If I where to decide to major in Accounting, would it be possible to double or minor in Econ, or would that be too much work? Would that even make sense as choices? I wouldn’t mind doing the work, but if they are both too math heavy, it could be even more difficult. Or would I be prepared for the job market by majoring in Accounting or Econ, and them minoring in something like finance or Business Administration?</p>
<p>And again, I’m simply trying to bounce options off of you more experienced members, not slacking in my own research.</p>
<p>Honestly, a minor in econ is going to be pretty useless on the job market (not because it’s econ, but because minors just really don’t matter). After you take some introductory econ classes, if you enjoy them, then go ahead and minor in it - do what you like, it’s more important that you enjoy what you’re studying than torturing yourself for the sake of getting a job. An accounting degree by itself will give you pretty solid job security. A double major is going to pretty hard to pull of in four years unless you have a decent amount of college credit built up from high school. I suggest that you not load up on majors and minors - it is important to experience classes in a number of areas.</p>
<p>I simply meant that at most of the good universities I’ve looked at, the engineering program is larger than the business program. I realize there are a lot of universities where this may not be the case and I do not know the number of students with each type of degree, so I may very well have been wrong about that.</p>
<p>If it makes you feel any better, just read that paragraph without that sentence. It’s still more than enough reasoning to dismiss the stupid CEO argument. Better yet, read the rest of the entire post, because it would effectively end this argument.</p>
<p>I suppose if I told everyone who was fairly sure they wanted to study and work in finance that they should study engineering, and then cited that they would be more likely to become a CEO of a large industrial or technology firm then I would be very informed, right?</p>
<p>Could be a bad sample. After all how, many (operating) mid size and large corporations are there? Could be faulty analysis. How many engineers become CEO’s of non technology oriented companies? That’s a better question. How does that compare with non-engineers becoming CEO’s of Tech companies?</p>
<p>It it about the engineer or is it the functional focus of the candidates? Operations Vs. Marketing Vs. Finance Vs. Accounting, Vs. R&D. Each type of candidate has his own ideas about risk and returns and how to manage a business.</p>
<p>You may be right about engineers. I would need a deeper analysis to believe it though. Any assessment base on a sample of just 500 rare occurrences (500 super companies) would be overly simplistic.</p>
<p>agc and tort: Thanks for your posts. My S is still in HS and is thinking of majoring in business. Your posts help clear up some of the questions about what majoring in business involves.</p>
<p>Sorry Whistle, right now what we need to know is what the major involves and then he will draw his own conclusions. He may decide not to major in Business but this won’t be because a guy on CC said it was a bad idea. I was parusing this thread for information not opinion.</p>
<p>After some more research, I realized I was kind of interested with the international tag. I’ve also seen that everything from finance to Econ can have an international tag. What exactly does this mean for differences in coursework and job placement? Is there more to it than just learning a foreign language? Is it more difficult than regular majors? Thanks again.</p>
<p>Because I was more finance focused my International business was centered mor on finance and economics. There are some unique risks and opportunities associated with international business. One challenge is dealing with international law and foreign laws. Then there are aspects of foreign trade import/export.</p>
<p>International business practice can take several forms</p>
<p>-Local business that imports
-local business that exports and must identify markets and distributors over seas
-local ‘’ that set up a distribution and sales under it’s own management overseas
local business that runs subsidiaries over seas (a multi-national business)
expatriates operating overseas but maintain local identity
foreign business importing here like the 2 above
foreign business with local subsidiaries
A business operating in several countries that may have several headquarters and national identities (Global Corporation)</p>
<p>Really only people who have no experience in an international business environment believe that the international business training is useless. The truth is that with out and understanding that business is global and how the dynamics of multinational business can effect the bottom line, those individuals are less competitive. That is if they intend to work for a multinational or a company that deals with foreign businesses. I don’t usually care to explain it to people who don’t seem to be interested. That’s the game. ;)</p>
<p>I have extensive experience overseas as a finance chief and as a military representative who helped rebuild an economy in a combat zone. Not fortune 500 but I have had Boeing executives coming to me for advice as well as U.S. Commerce officials asking me how it’s done. I’ve worked with U.N.D.P. and many city governments at home and overseas in developing and commerce programs</p>
<p>I worked on an M&A project in the Republic of South Africa (RSA) part of which involved some industrial land with rail access to the ports. We were negotiating with Boeing to lease that property. This was part of the due diligence. The U.S. Commercial Office was involved along with Anglogold and Harmony Mines and the IDC (the development arm of the Freestate Provincial Government). We were also inviting other U.S. contractors for other things like environmental impact studies.</p>
<p>I was the finance chief so along with contracting and financing I was central to the due diligence effort. It was a necessary step before we could settle on the deal. It’s like the Appraisal and home inspection before you purchase a house but on steroids. We had 3 going concerns I had to audit and restructure and 3 real estate properties in various stages of developed and undeveloped which we had to evaluate and plan for. I also have forex issues with our U.S. debt and our RSA revenue, our RSA Debt and RSA/USA taxes and bookkeeping. We use PWC as our auditors and focused on using IGAAP for structuring our finances. When a multinational finance chief deals in forex, it’s not about arbitrage for profit it’s about mitigating foreign exchange risk and planning cashflows accordingly. I was also concerned with local Human Resources laws and payroll and employee relations. That was complicated and, at times, the most stressful part. Local law, local culture, and local economy have a lot to do with your multinational decisions. It seem small at a glance but the wrong reaction that offends the wrong stakeholder can ruin you business and cause catastrophic failure.</p>
<p>South Africa is a notoriously difficult country to operate in as Americans so when word got out about how far we got int our process we had Americans knocking down our door to find out how they can improve their approach.</p>