<p>I'm going to be entering my fourth year at a pretty good public university next year. My original plan was to attend law school, but now I'm seriously rethinking that plan due to the horrible market for lawyers and the exorbitant amount of debt I would have to take on to attend law school. I'm strongly considering picking up a second major in Accounting in order to make myself more employable.</p>
<p>I read the taxguy's post in the featured thread at the top of this forum and plan on going back to read through more of that thread. But I have a couple of questions that are a bit unique to me, so if anyone could help that would be great.</p>
<p>1) Is the market for accountants still as good as taxguy said it was 2 years ago? Do you think it will stay this way for the foreseeable future? I know the Bureau of Labor Statistics paints an awfully rosy picture, but just making sure...</p>
<p>2) My ultimate goal is to be employed by a Big 4 firm by the time I graduate. As of right now I have nothing impressive or business related on my resume. I do know that the Big 4 recruit a decent amount of kids from my school. I have a high GPA and nothing else. What steps do I need to land an internship with a Big 4 next summer and ultimately end up employed by them?</p>
<p>3) I will be attending college for five years if I do accounting because I'm switching so late in my college career. My state accounting board requires 150 credit hours of education in order to earn a CPA. I know a lot of people do a M.Acc. in order to obtain these necessary hours. However, since I will likely hit 150 hours because I'll be in undergrad for an extra year, I can gain a CPA license without a M.Acc., correct? I imagine that there wouldn't be any reason for me to get a M.Acc., if I already meet the requirements to obtain a CPA in my state, correct? </p>
<p>Thanks in advance for any help!</p>
<p>If you have a good GPA, you’ll be able to get a job. You can get your CPA with 150hours, so an MPA would be useless for you.(since you dont need anymore hours)</p>
<p>Dont X Law school out just yet, depending on where you live/go to school; you might be able to get a job.</p>
<p>Thank God that he put you on the right track. I have been reading some posts by lawyers, and some of them are literally crying because of the job market. If you do not go to Ivy, then forget about the law school. You do not even need to ask questions because, as I see, you already know the anwers for them :). Out of curiosity, what was your major before you switched to accounting?</p>
<p>One more thing, with 150 hours and high GPA you will have pretty good chances in getting a job at big 4 and any other company, even without previous business experience.</p>
<p>Hi FrenchBoy, thanks for your input. Your input is comforting and I sure hope that it’s right!</p>
<p>Also about law school, I’ve researched it pretty extensively. Simply put, after analyzing the costs/benefits of law school, I’ve decided that it’s not worth it for me. I don’t really want to talk about law school in this thread as I want it to be focused on accounting. Anyways, I could always attend law school later if accounting doesn’t work out.</p>
<p>Hi Toshtemirov,</p>
<p>I’m so glad to hear that my high GPA will be so beneficial in firm recruiting. I of course have to maintain it, but it’s pretty hard for it to drop (or increase) significantly at this point because I have so many credit hours. I was honestly not expecting this. I thought my lack of business/any real work experience would be a huge detriment.</p>
<p>My major is currently Political Science.</p>
<p>It wasn’t taxguy that told me how bad the market for lawyers is. It’s something that I’ve been reading about and talking to lawyers and law students pretty extensively over the course of the last few months as I wanted to attend law school. My high GPA/LSAT actually gives me a decent shot everywhere outside of Yale/Harvard/Stanford. But ultimately the risk associated with taking out $120-$150K in loans and spending three years in law school to end up with a job that pays $70K or unemployed is not something I wanted to do. And to be frank, I don’t really have any reason for attending law school other than I just wanted to make a lot of money…</p>
<p>Thanks for the input so far guys!</p>
<p>well you can make a lot of money through both of those careers. take and pass the CPA exam.</p>
<p>A question regarding CPA requirements. Let’s say by the time I graduate from college with an Accounting degree, I have 150 hours and 21 credit hours in Accounting. My state requires 24 credit hours in Accounting to be a licensed CPA. Can I just take one extra Accounting class at a local university where I’ll be working instead of having to do an entire M.Acc. program?</p>
<p>I think if you just want a job period, a decent GPA will net you at least a government job. If you’re a rockstar, great gpa, great “community” stuff, great communicator, team player, you should be a shooin for big4.</p>
<p>Thesituation,</p>
<p>Of course you can!</p>
<p>Thanks Toshtemirov! That’s what I thought but I wasn’t sure. </p>
<p>A question regarding career opportunities for accountants: How difficult is it to move into a Big 4 firm if you don’t get hired by a Big4 right after graduation? Do they basically only hire kids fresh out of undergrad and if you messed up during campus recruiting, you’re pretty much out of luck with the Big4? I mean how difficult would it be for someone who has experience working at a medium/small accounting firm to move over to a Big4 firm with a couple years of experience + CPA licensure? </p>
<p>Just wondering, what happens in case I miss the Big4 boat right after graduation…</p>
<p>Not sure why the “big 4” is considered the be-all end-all of accounting careers. Personally if I were an accountant I’d much rather work for a small or mid-size firm. Who wants or needs all that bureaucratic B.S.? And I mean, I would just much rather be in a position to actually make a difference and leave my imprint than be another brick in the wall at a large corporation.</p>
<p>working for “the big 4” isnt all that great…</p>
<p>Generally, people usually switch from the big 4 to the mid sized companies. Big 4 only gives you a valuable working experience, but nothing else. You have much more chances to become a partner or a CFO at the mid/small sized companies than at the big 4.<br>
I do not know exactly whether they accept people who already have an experience, but obviously, they suppose to. It would have been unwise to not hire a person who already has some experience and CPA certified. However, I do not think that anyone would go back to the big 4, if he/she would already have a stable job and a higher income, unless they offer you to become a partner, or a senior manager.
For instance, my friend’s brother worked at the PwC for 4 years, and he became a senior manager, but at the same time, he did not have a personal life, and wanted to get married. So, he left the PwC and now he is working at the United Nations, and earns almost twise as much as he did at PwC, 120k. He works only 5 days a week, only 8 to 9 hours, and he also has an amazing benefits. He atomatically gets any visas, and when he travels to other countries, he is treated like a diplomat. Isn’t that great? By the way, he is a CPA, but he does not have a masters degree, only 150 undergraduate hours. As you can see, he was able to become successful by only having a CPA license.</p>
<p>People work at Big Four usually in order to move to large companies, i.e. Fortune 500 companies. These are the clients that the Big Four audit. If you would like to work at a smaller company eventually, you will be fine starting at a smaller firm because smaller firms target smaller companies. </p>
<p>You do not become a senior manager after four years. You become a senior auditor/associate or whatever. TOTALLY DIFFERENT. The promotion plan is Staff for 3 years, Senior for 2 or 3, Manager for a few years, then Senior Manager, then Partner(possibly you can be a “Director” in between Sr Manager and Partner depending on the firm and your situation). </p>
<p>Historically not having a Masters hasn’t been a problem. Now that everyone has one because of the 150 hour rule you will have a hard time if you don’t have one yourself. Big Four recruiting is focused heavily on people pursuing that degree, NOT the ones that screwed around has history majors and decided to go into accounting when they decided they wanted to have jobs. I was told by a Big Four partner they wouldn’t even hire people without an Masters because their HR people said those without would feel like they weren’t up to par. Whether that’s true or not, I dunno…fact is they can hire only those with Masters and meet their quotas…</p>
<p>By Jonahrubin,
1)"You do not become a senior manager after four years. You become a senior auditor/associate or whatever. TOTALLY DIFFERENT.</p>
<p>It is not always true. If you have good promotions, then you can become almost anyone.
At small/mid companies you can even become a partner after 4 years, if someone leaves, or retires.</p>
<p>2) "Big Four recruiting is focused heavily on people pursuing that degree, NOT the ones that screwed around has history majors and decided to go into accounting when they decided they wanted to have jobs. I was told by a Big Four partner they wouldn’t even hire people without an Masters because their HR people said those without would feel like they weren’t up to par. Whether that’s true or not, I dunno…fact is they can hire only those with Masters and meet their quotas… "</p>
<p>I have never heard of it. I do not know in which state you live or study, but the majority of big 4 workers are getting hired after undergraduate degree, and they do not even have 150 hours of education. Still, a masters degree is obviously prefered. Some employers require you to have a masters degree, but others do not. For example, in order to be a college professor, you have to have at least a masters degree, but it is not true for big 4.</p>
<p>The vast majority of entry-level people working at the Big 4 are undergraduate degree holders. Whoever told you that in regards to needing a masters is blowing some serious smoke up your ***. I’ve never heard that before until now and it is unquestionably false.</p>
<p>@Toshtemirov–if your friend doubled their salary to $120k, they were making 60k before…which is senior associate salary range, definitely not senior manager.</p>
<p>Inmotion, you are wrong. The 150 hour rule and the rise of 5 year programs has changed the landscape.</p>