Abstract Accounting teachers can easily be so concerned to help their students grasp technicalities that they may miss the opportunity to drop suggestions now and then regarding the social service rendered by modern accounting. Business activities are such a prominent part of modern life that an elementary understanding of business, such as can be obtained through even a little study of accounting, can prepare the individual to be a more comprehending citizen. For example, business enterprises generate a very large amount of government revenue. Some understanding of enterprise accounting therefore provides some understanding of one of the bases on which modern government stands-government services paid for by revenue derived from business profits. Accounting not only gives us a glimpse of business as a generator of tax revenue but it helps us to realize that business, in one way or another, "is the paymaster of us all." Out of business activities comes wages of workers, wages of capital, wages of management. Business-by division of labor, by use of machine power, by developing mass distribution of products has created vast areas of employment for men and capital.

Abstract Reviews the book "Accounting for Colleges and Universities," by Clarence Scheps.

Abstract The high school student comes to college with the highest expectations only to be confronted in many cases by a self-conscious, ill-at-ease, and nervous instructor who tries to impress the class with all he knows about accounting rather than to make the subject matter comprehensible to the student. It is quite possible that potential accountants are frightened out of the field by the instructor in principles who points out how "tough" accounting is and how few can pass the first course. If the mastery of accounting principles is difficult, it is the shortcoming of the instructor who fails to simplify his presentation, the merit of the text used notwithstanding. The three major factors contributing to the plight of accounting principles are (1) the low esteem in which the introductory courses are held by the staff, (2) the fallacious assumption that anybody can teach principles of accounting, and (3) the faulty departmental organization. In general, there is no prestige attached to the principles course because the higher ranking and higher paid members of the staff teach only advanced courses. What is the way out of the dilemma which is unfair to the beginner in accounting and unjust to the profession? First of all, the problem has to be recognized and enough courage summoned to take corrective action. The problem is to build up esteem for the introductory courses, and to train and supervise closely the new instructors as well as to delegate authority over these courses to senior staff members.

Abstract Reviews the book "Depreciation," by Eugene L. Grant and Paul T. Norton.

Abstract Reviews the book "Corporate Finance and Regulation," by Chelcie C. Bosland.

Abstract Reviews the book "Elementary Accounting," 3rd ed., by John Arch White.

Abstract The study of accountancy may be said to possess three primary use values: (1) as a foundation for a professional career in public accounting, (2) as providing knowledge of an information service for business management and investors, (3) as one way of leaning disciplined thinking about dealing with data. The first two uses are well known and need no elaboration here. The third use value is the sort usually attributed to mathematics and statistics. But accounting also insists on accurate identification of detail and the organization of data in a meaningful way. Its study at the university level provides some of the same kind of beneficial discipline as these other subjects, and therefore it possesses general educational values in addition to the more strictly technical values for students of business management and professional accounting. Use values such as these have been clearly recognized as lying in the study of accounting. Because of this, there has been a widespread acceptance of the subject matter as useful outside of a purely occupational framework for a career in accounting as such.

Abstract The article focuses on the improvement of present curricula and methods of accounting teaching. The author argues that the there is a need for improvement in the methods of examinations. The greatest opportunity for improvement lies in the direction of a strong trend toward greater objectivity in those examinations. Accounting, like mathematics, lends itself naturally and easily to the objective techniques. The argument for the objective technique is usually based upon the ease and sureness with which it serves this grading function. Many early efforts at objective examining run into student resistance. Such resistance is often at least partially justified because most early attempts in the new medium are likely to include a few bad items, and students, especially the best ones, are quick to spot such ambiguous, unanswerable items. The cure for this is item-analysis of the results of every test. The ability to analyze and organize is basically the ability to recognize and appraise significant relationships among insolated factors each of which is by itself a simple statement of fact.

Abstract The discussion of the accumulation and analysis of cost data for production and investment decisions raises a question about the basic procedure for accumulating the original cost data. Cost and production data are used for a variety of purposes: valuing inventories, determining profits or losses on individual orders or groups of products or operations, measuring efficiency of production, establishing prices, selecting the best of alternative methods of producing, measuring obsolescence and many other purposes. No single cost figure is equally satisfactory for all managerial decisions-some decisions require partial costs, others, such as the determination of obsolescence, require imputed cost such as interest. The central fact is that some of the decisions of management require a segregation of costs according to the extent to which they vary in total with the rate of output. A corollary of this is that none of the other decisions of management requires that cost and production data be accumulated on a basis inconsistent with the distinction between fixed and variable costs.