Knowledge that Transforms

Reviews the book " Accounting Method," by C. Rufus Rorem.

Reviews the book "Factory Management," by Paul M. Atkins

In connection with the accounting terms, assets, liabilities, and net worth, a word of caution is necessary. By definition, it is obvious that in any case the total asset minus the total liabilities is equal to the net worth. As a result of this method of portrayal, the balance sheet has often been completely misunderstood and the layman frequently asks why it is that assets and liabilities are always of equal amount. To explain, the accountant has upon occasion gone so far as to personalize the business as distinct from its owner, and the net worth is referred to as a liability of the business to its owner. This, of course, only leads to confusion and various attempts have been made to explain the situation more clearly. Thus it has been advocated that the term liabilities be abandoned and that there be substituted therefore the term equities. Under this plan all obligations of a business to creditors and others are termed equities and the net worth of the business is termed the equity of the proprietor.

Reviews the book "The General Accounting Office--Its History, Activities, and Organization," by Darrell H. Smith.

At the present time it is becoming more generally recognized than formerly that a business concern is made up of a series of interlocking activities or functions. To a considerable extent the administration of a business means the adequate and thorough control of the major functions. To facilitate this administration, various devices are set up, the purpose of which is to supply information to the executive or to aid him in putting into effect the policies which have been adopted. One of the means of control which has been receiving an increasing degree of attention in recent years is factory cost accounting. Hence one of the tasks which has confronted university schools of business is that of teaching their students something of the nature, operation and use of the system of records and accounts by means of which information concerning factory costs may be obtained. While a system of cost accounts and records may serve various ends, in most instances its primary reason for being is that it provides a very valuable means of control for the assistance of the general manager, his associates and assistants.

The article presents recent developments in departments related to accounting and economics in several universities and colleges across the U.S. In the absence of Dean E. W. Lord and Assistant Dean R. Davis during the second semester of Boston university, Boston, Massachusetts, Professor Atlee L. Percy of the accounting department has been named acting dean of the College of Business Administration. Professor Percy has thus been appointed Chairman of the Educational Committee of the Massachusetts Society of Certified Professional Accountants (CPA). At the University of California, Los Angeles, California, A. Frank Lloyd, a teaching fellow, has joined the staff of Mclaren, Goode and Co., CPA's. Morris H. Harrison, W.D. Moore and Sterling Reece have been appointed teaching fellows to fill vacancies. Professor Gordan A. Watkins has been acting chairman of the Economic Department during the absence of Professor H.S. Noble. H.E. Crawford, assistant in accounting at the University of Illinois, Chicago, Illinois, has been joining the staff of Arthur Anderson and co. at Kansas City, Kansas. Edwin L. Theies has been coming to the department as assistant professor.

Reviews the book "Accounting Reports in Business Management," by Homer E. Gregory.

Reviews the book "Problems in Finance," by Cecil Eaton Fraser.

Reviews the book "Hotel Accounting Including Departmental Control, Food Costing and Auditing," by Ernest B. Horwath and Louis Toth.

The author in the article discusses the progress of the Bureau of Placements of the American Institute of Accountants as he received a number of letters from teachers of accounting which indicate that some are not in entire sympathy with the work of the Bureau. The author attempts to give first a brief summary of the purpose for which the Bureau of Placements was organized and of what it has accomplished to date. He then attempts to answer the questions raised in the letters received from accounting teachers. However, the author also notifies that these comments do not represent the official opinion of the American Institute of Accountants nor of the Committee for Placements, and should be regarded as his personal comments. In a letter to the author, an accounting teacher objects to the statement by the author that "It has been the experience of accountancy firms that men graduated from cultural courses in the liberal arts and science develop quite as rapidly as men who have devoted most of their time to technical accounting study." The author clarifies that this sentence does not refer to men who have had the combined cultural and technical study previously referred to. This statement, moreover, was intended to encourage the academic man with desirable natural qualifications to make an application.