Abstract The article focuses on direct costing. It is to find a single subject that can compare during the past few years with direct costing when it comes to popularity for article-writing, speech giving, debates and friendly discussions among people interested in accounting. One is often inclined to think that most everything that can be said for or against direct costing has already been said and that surely the enthusiasm, both pro and con, is soon to give way to newer and perhaps more constructive subject matter for accountants' considerations. Yet there seems still to be considerable uncertainty as to just what the term means and what it implies for accounting purposes. Many of the advantages which are hailed as outgrowths of direct costing procedures have been in use for many years by all informed managements and many of the disadvantages proclaimed by those who find fault with the procedure are aimed at relatively unimportant implications and not at the heart of the matter. At least some of the uncertainty surrounding considerations of direct costing is the result of inappropriate terminology.

Reviews the book "Using Information to Manage," by Arthur B. Toan.

Abstract The article focuses on the problems faced by the accountants in measuring human resources. Although financial reports do not recently provide the information necessary to answer all the questions related to this problem, a growing number of corporate managers are showing concerns that their accounting systems are not adequate. As corporate managers make expenditures which they justify as investments in human resources , accountants reflect them as immediate charges to income without considering the timing of expected benefits. Human resource information is essential for each of the several phases of management's planning and control functions. Management of human resources should assist in recognizing and defining problems . There is some evidence to indicate a degree of meaningful correlation between profitability of organizations and their expenditures on acquisition, training, and relation of human resource. This suggests that firms with a high human asset investment ration will ultimately generate high profits.

Abstract The article presents information about the report of the 1959 Committee on Management Accounting. The 1959 Committee has directed its efforts toward an amplification of this view of the nature and significance of management accounting by stating in more definite terms the functions to be performed by accounting in a business entity organized for profit, and by a listing of the major problem areas in which management accounting is of prime importance. The role of management accounting is to provide the management of a business with analyses and evaluations to assist in the fulfillment of this basic responsibility for effectively planning and controlling profits and investments. It is a service which is oriented toward the evaluation of the financial soundness of the future operating plans and programs of the enterprise and the anticipated profit consequences of alternative courses of action. The Committee believes that a significant need exists for a better and more general awareness of the proper role of management accounting in a well-managed business.

Abstract In January 1957, the Executive Committee of the American Accounting Association appointed the first committee on management accounting; the primary charge being "to clarify just what is meant by the term management accounting. In recent years there has been a growing awareness of the potential utilization of accounting data by management for internal purposes. At the same time there has been an increasing recognition of the limitations of accounting as it exists today in meeting these needs. Management accounting is the application of appropriate techniques and concepts in processing the historical and projected economic data of an entity to assist management in establishing a plan for reasonable economic objectives and in the making of rational decisions with a view toward achieving these objectives. It includes the methods and concepts necessary for effective planning, for choosing among alternative business actions and for control through the evaluation and interpretation of performance. Management accounting concepts are especially important in that they deal with the fundamentals of maximizing return on investment, a primary objective of the business entity. This is especially true in the field of marketing where the broad and complex problems of pricing, methods of distribution, marginal cost and product mix must be met and solved.

Abstract When a student enrolls in one of our classes we feel, as we are sure you do if you are a teacher, that we have an obligation to give him everything, accounting- wise, that one can during the time in which he is with others. In fact we feel that this obligation or responsibility encompasses not only the student but also his parents, the accounting department, the university, the state and last but not least the accounting profession. People feel sure that in many instances the use of visual aids helps in fulfilling this obligation. Not only are such aids frequently time-saving in the presentation of a given amount of information, but also they often permit one to present a greater quantity of information and, at the same time, more up-to-date information. Transparency projection, although one of the newest types of projection, is, in many instances, rapidly becoming one of the most popular. This type of projection, which is basically the same as that frequently used in bowling alleys whereby scores are grease-pencilled on transparent sheets and projected upon a screen, often provides an instructor with many opportunities for imparting more information in less time.