Knowledge that Transforms

Reviews the book "New York Laws Affecting Business Corporations," 11th ed.

Reviews the book "The Menace of Overproduction," by Scoville Hamlin.

Abstract The various revenue acts of the United States have neither included nor excluded charitable and similar contributions by corporations as deductible items. The Commissioner and the courts have ruled that they are not deductible. But the laws have made the ordinary and necessary of conducting a business, deductible, and among these expenses the Commissioner, the courts, and the Board of Tax Appeals have included certain contributions by corporations that appeared to have been made with the expectation that direct and immediate benefits would accrue to the corporations as a result of the contributions. Contributions are made by business men either from motives of philanthropy or because they believe that certain benefits will accrue there from to their business. In the case of the individual contributor, both types of contributions should be allowed as deductions. In the case of the corporation, the second type should properly be allowed in practically all cases, in as much as the judgment of the corporation's officials as to the benefits likely to be secured is presumed to be as reliable as that of the Commissioner or his agents.

Reviews the book "Corporation Accounting," by William T. Sunley and Paul W. Pinkerton.

Reviews various books on accounting. "Tendenzen zur Aussonderung von Vermögenswertänderungen in Betriebswirtschaftslehre, Wirtschaftspraxis und Steuerrecht," by Henerich Horn; "Die nennwetlose Aktie," by Werner Rusche; Erfassung und Verrechnung der Gemeinskosten in der Unternehmung," by Frits Hensel.

Reviews the book "Economics of Accountancy," by John B. Cunning.

Abstract Methods of the usual, present, orthodox type are unstabilized because they ignore all lack of uniformity in the value content of the measuring-unit in which the depreciation is expressed. If, for instance, a building cost $50,000 in 1910 and had an expected life of twenty years, with no final scrap value, the depreciation, according to the customary, straight-line method would be the unstabilized one of $2,500 for each of the twenty years regardless of whether, as thus stated in the dollar value of 1910, it was equivalent to $2,500 in the average general price level of each of such twenty pars. Orthodox calculation of depreciation thus assumes that the original cost, when distributed as depreciation over subsequent periods, will continue to have the same economic significance as it had when incurred-or, in other words, that the monetary standard of measurement remains stable in value. The chief merit of such an unstabilised depreciation method is the greater ease in theory and application resulting from the assumption of a higher degree of simplicity in the measurement of facts than is actually there.

Reviews the book "Credits and Collections in Theory and Practice," by Theodore Beckman.

Reviews the book "Overhead Expense," by A. Hamilton Church

Abstract In building a curriculam for any school, the educational objective of the school and the character and extent of the educational preparation possessed by the entering students, invariably dominates the process. Since graduate schools of business administration have been excluded from consideration, one can say that the mental equipment and training of the average high-school graduate determine the ability of the student of a collegiate school of business. Three courses have been found to be satisfactory instruments for the student in collegiate schools of business. The first is designed to give a mastery of those mathematical principles and methods which must be used in business, finance, and management calculations, if such calculations are to be made effectively. Other courses are, Course In General Mathematics For Business Students and Elementary Business Mathematics and Advanced Mathematics of Business Management, and Planning and Forecasting. For these 60 hour courses, the tools developed in General Mathematics Course are most helpful.