Slaying the Quantitative Goliath.
Abstract The accounting profession and accounting education have increasingly become more specialized, and necessarily so. The field is too large and the material too complex for accountants to be true experts in every area. The operations research area is perhaps analogous to the area of federal income taxes. Each accountant must have a certain minimum knowledge about taxes, but people need not know all of intricacies of tax law. The first big problem to be overcome is fear of tackling the area at all. As indicated in the allegory, the two indispensable aids in accomplishing this end are an understanding of college algebra, and an understanding of elementary statistics. To become a real expert in linear programming would require a commitment of time and effort which is probably not justified, but to become thoroughly conversant in it and comfortable about it, is not such a big task, and will provide with a solid springboard for tackling the rest of the quantitative field. It seems that this approach is better than starting out with a survey of the entire operations research/quantitative methods field on a general level.
- DOI
- 10.2308/tar-4482211
- Volume
- 43 (4)
- Pages
- 779-781
- Language
- en
- Export
- BibTeX
- Sources
- openalex crossref