A number of concepts and conditions in current city planning are questioned: the grand master plan delusion; planning after the fact; intermittent master planning; the illusion of complete study; avoiding the critical problems; trying to do everything; sematic confusion; conflicts of role and organization; unrealistic derivation of goals and objectives; failure of city planning in the general public interest; deficiencies of planning personnel; inadequacies of theory and research; underestimating fundamental difficulties of the city planning endeavor.

Abstract Changes in the economy have prompted changes in the information needs in all areas of accounting. New cause and effect relationships develop and new concepts emerge which must be given accounting expression. The accounting profession is therefore faced with a need for accounting data which must be accommodated. The magnitude of the challenge reveals the magnitude of the opportunity. There is every reason to believe that socio-economic accounting will provide the thrust necessary to tremendously expand the world of accounting. In this connection, there is an old Hindu saying which seems appropriate here, that "There is no door, but only a small window, that leads to a great new world." However, the saying requires a bit of paraphrasing for, actually, in this case, there is no window. Nevertheless, accounttants do have access to, perhaps, a key hole. The light provided by this small key- hole reveals that there are numerous answers to the challenges posed by socio- economic accounting and they all focus on research.

A major purpose of the Estes study was to determine, by using questionnaires, the expected usefulness of current cost information for various classes of assets, both current and long term.2 Two assumptions were made in conducting the study: (1) current costs were objectively measurable, and (2) the current cost information would be of a supplementary nature only. The sample was selected from three organizations: the Institute of Chartered Financial Analysts, the National Association of Bank Loan Officers and Credit Men (Robert Morris Associates), and the Financial Executives Institute. These groups were chosen because Estes believed they closely paralleled two major financial statement user groups: (1) investors, both current and potential, and (2) lenders. Questionnaires were sent to 300 members from each group. A total of 338 or 37.8% responded. The results of the study were that 81 percent of the item responses

T O measure a nation's wealth, an industry's productive potential or the consumption of a durable stock, we must be able to add machines with different characteristics and different vintages to form an aggregate. Ideally, such a measure would change with machinery deterioration and obsolescence but not with pure price level changes which leave the use of the machinery the same. The aggregation task would be easier if we had information about the nature of depreciation. For example, if depreciation is a constant rate, and that rate remains the same over time, then the aggregate is a simple weighted average of the component machines, the weights being derived from the known depreciation rate. This model is not uncommon, yet its assumptions are clearly restrictive. It would be very useful if there were sufficient empirical evidence pertaining to the nature of depreciation patterns to either confirm or reject such a simple model. It is the intent of this paper to provide some of that evidence. One natural approach to studying decay of capital is to study the in-use cost of machines as they age. Depreciation values could be estimated from changes in rental prices throughout a machine's life. In the absence of welldeveloped rental markets, however, resale values would yield approximations of the remaining value of machinery after a period of use. This paper constructs actual depreciation figures for automobiles from purchase prices, and studies assumptions and hypotheses about the relationship between new and used machinery. In particular, three assumptions are common. First, it is often assumed that depreciation patterns remain fixed over time. For this assumption to be valid, any technological change must be either nonexistent or smooth. There can be no sudden, dramatic innovations, since these would change the nature of depreciation schemes. Similarly, it is often assumed that machinery of the same type depreciates in the same fashion. This assumption will also be studied. The third and most common assumption is that equipment depreciates at a constant rate.' This is a very useful assumption, since it greatly simplifies the relationship between new and used pieces of equipment. These assumptions will be tested for automobiles using figures for nineteen different makes from 1950 to 1969.