In this article the author comments on the critical review of one of his articles by George J. Staubus. He states that he has been at some pains to point out that more than one kind of information is necessary to every choice, and that monetary magnitudes of quite different types are necessary. According to him there are the monetary magnitudes of the assets and equities a firm has at any time. Then there are the monetary magnitudes obtained by discounting the expected cash inflows and outflows from proceeding in the same way as up to the point of choice, and from every alternative course which seems to be feasible at the point of choice. There is no problem of dealing in money and goods in a deliberate and informed manner for which both types of magnitudes are not necessary. Among the things an investor might expect to know are the rates of return earned by the two companies, their liquidities or degrees of solvency, and their leverages. The author concludes that for any choice between holding an asset and acquiring another, whether by managers or investors, current cash equivalents of the assets held enter into the statement of conditions for informed choice.

In this article the author comments on the work on accounting, evaluation and economic behavior by R.J. Chambers. The author states that many reviewers have suggested that accountants will often disagree with Chambers' postulates and definitions and will prefer alternatives that will result in entirely different conclusions to those reached by Chambers. Here the author further points out the possible inadequacies and inconsistencies within Chambers' system that have not been mentioned in the literature to date and suggests ways of overcoming them. Chambers defines financial positions as the capacity of an entity at a point of time to engage in indirect exchanges, it is represented by the relationship between the monetary properties of the means in possession and the monetary properties of the obligations of an entity. Thus Chambers acknowledges that action is not instantaneous and in respect of assets considers capacity to engage in indirect exchanges is measured by market resale prices in the short-run.

Reviews the book "Financial Management," by R.J. Chambers.

The notion that the going concern concept is necessary for us to account is erroneous. Vatter has pointed out, and rightly, that "we could assume noncontinuity if we wanted to." Thus, there is a free choice to be made. If one chooses to assume a going concern, then that assumption ought to be justifiable and its consequences ought to he carefully worked out. It is thought that one such consequence is historical cost valuation. That consequence is derived by either the non-liquidation or the it-doesn't-make-any-difference argument. It has been demonstrated that the non-liquidation argument is invalid and unsound, and that the it-doesn't-make-any-difference argument is true only in a stationary state. Therefore, the alleged consequence of historical cost is erroneous. It is difficult to justify the assumption of a going concern because of uncertainty about what the future holds, particularly in matters of commerce. Therefore, if the going concern concept is to be retained, it ought to he reinterpreted as a prediction. Another alternative is to purge the going concern concept insofar as it applies to the future of the firm. The change from the venture concept to a going concern concept does not necessitate that the future be predicted or assumed. Instead, it requires only that the measurement be made at a point in time because information is needed prior to a future event. One can measure the change that has occurred in a continuing process without knowledge of how that process will change in the future. Perhaps we could call this the temporal concept in contrast to the venture or event concept. This concept ought to be extended to the valuation of the components of the firm as well as to the firm, and to the valuation coefficients of assets as well as to the quantities of assets.

Reviews the book "The Foundations of Accounting Measurement: A Mathematical, Economic, and Behavioral Inquiry," by Yuji Ijiri.

The article presents information about defining and measuring income under conditions of changing prices. The first issue concerns the extent to which changing prices or changing money values should be provided for in formulating income and wealth concepts. A second area of controversy is concerned with the method of incorporating information about price changes into accounting records and financial statements. The third issue is linked with the first argument about income and balance sheet concepts, but is concerned particularly with the role of measurement in accounting and with the determination of current values. It is possible to distinguish three broad approaches to income (and wealth) theory and measurement, corresponding to what might be called a generalized purchasing power approach, a current-value approach and a relative price change approach. The current-value concept of business income may be described by the term current income, defined as the increment in wealth resulting from the current productive activities of the business during a particular period of time, expressed in current prices of the period.

R. Sato, M. J. Beckmann; Neutral Inventions and Production Functions1, The Review of Economic Studies, Volume 35, Issue 1, 1 January 1968, Pages 57–66, htt