The Securities Exchange Act of 1934 are aptly referred to as "disdosure" statutes. This early, major New Deal legislation was enacted in the aftermath of the stock market "crash" of 1929 and in the depths of the Great Depression, as a remedy to the faults that many believed characterized the stock markets. Considering the current possibility that the SEC will require more disclosure from conglomerates and the 35 years that have elapsed since the Acts were enacted, people should examine whether or not the legislation was, in fact, justified and what its impact has been. This examination is limited to the accounting disclosure requirements of the Securities Acts. While the Acts include provisions for regulating the operation of stock exchanges, registration of brokers, etc., the required disdosure of financial accounting information by corporations is of primary importance. This study sought to answer several questions related to the impact of the SEC's accounting disclosure requirements. The author found that there was little evidence of fraud related to financial statements in the period prior to the enactment of the Securities Acts. Nor was there a widespread lack of disclosure. A considerable number of corporations traded on the New York Stock Exchange disclosed at least sales, gross profit, and depredation and almost all reported net income and detailed balance sheets with current assets and current liabilities given. Investors who wanted accounting data had many investment opportunities available. Hence, the author conclude that there was little justification for the accounting disclosure required by the Acts.

The article discusses the applications and limitations of multiple regression analysis on cost behavior. The author asserts that regression analysis is not only a valuable tool but a method made available, inexpensive and easy to use by computers. When one considers that costs often are caused by many different factors whose effects are not obvious, one recognizes the great possibilities of regression analysis. In addition, this method must not be used in cost situations where there is not an ongoing stationary relationship between cost and the variables upon which cost depend.

Motivating employees to work for the goals of the firm has long been one of management's most important and vexing problems. The search for methods that motivate effectively, that induce the employee to work harder for the firm's goals, led to experimentation with a wide diversity of devices. In recent years, several writers emphasized that the firm's accounting system has a direct influence on the motivation of managers. This paper (a) surveys the available findings of research done in the behavioral sciences and organization theory as they bear on motivation and (b) critically examines the accounting system and reports in the light of such findings. Decentralization contributes to effective motivation. The firm's accounting system facilitates decentralization and hence has an indirect but important impact on motivation. The direct use of accounting reports, such as budgets, for motivation can result in reduced performance, if the budget is imposed on the department manager. The accounting system facilitates decentralization, which is conducive to effective motivation. Furthermore, the careful use of accounting reports can directly contribute toward effective motivation by expressing goals and by supplying knowledge of performance.

The Securities Exchange Act of 1934 was one of the earliest and, some believe, one of the most successful laws enacted by the New Deal. The stock market crash in 1929 and the Great Depression provided the impetus for reform of the stock markets in the belief that weaknesses of the institutions and ineptitude and/or chicanery among brokers and bankers were partially responsible for the losses incurred by stockholders. Although many critics, reformers and congressmen wanted Congress to enact blue skies legislation that would require all securities sold and traded to be approved by the federal government, President Franklin Roosevelt preferred the concept of (see Francis Wheat (1967)). Rather than having the government approve or disapprove securities, corporations whose securities are publicly sold and traded are required to disclose a large amount of predominantly financial information to the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) who make these data available to the public. Indeed, the Securities Exchange Act is described in its title and usually referred to as a statute. Although the financial community generally opposed this legislation and the preceding Securities Act of 1933,1 most brokers, investors and government officials probably would find it difficult to conceive of the successful operation of the stock markets without the Securities Acts. Yet the economic rationale for the regulation of the securities markets was not examined carefully before the legislation was passed (which is not surprising, given turbulent times) nor has it been since,2 even though the Securities Act of 1934 was extended in 1964 to include most corporations whose stock is publicly owned. Such an examination of one important part of the law-the financial disclosure requirements-is presented here. This analysis is particularly timely because the SEC appears to be shifting its emphasis towards increasing the disclosure requirements of almost all corporations whose stock is traded in the markets.3

George J. Benston, Risk on Consumer Finance Company Personal Loans, The Journal of Finance, Vol. 32, No. 2, Papers and Proceedings of the Thirty-Fifth Annual Meeting of the American Finance Association, Atlantic City, New Jersey, September 16-18, 1976 (May, 1977), pp. 593-607