Accounting is often referred to as the language of business as it usually facilitates the communication of the financial position of a company in a way that various users can understand. In simple terms, accounting basically involves setting up, maintaining, and reviewing the accounting records of a company in order to properly understand its financial position.
There are many users, both internally and externally, of the accounting records of an entity. Internal users typically refer to the management, while external users refers to investors and lenders. Accurate information has to be given as regards the financial position of the establishment as manipulation this information can be of great risk to the organization.
Business accountants refer to accountants concerned with providing accounting services to businesses.
What Are Accounting Scandals?
Accounting scandals arise from intentional manipulation of financial statements with the disclosure of financial misdeeds by trusted executives of corporations or governments.
Consequences Of Restatement
The ‘Corporate Governance Consequences of Accounting Scandals: Evidence from Top Management, CFO and Auditor Turnover’ paper by Anup Agrawal and Tommy Cooperpaper examine the consequences of accounting scandals perpetuated by Crown lawyers at the fraud trial of three former Nortel Networks executives. According to the prosecution the men defrauded $5,000,000, accomplished by engineering a financial loss in 2002, and a profit in 2003 thereby triggering return to profit bonuses of $70 million to top executives.
Using logistic regression models, which control for the other determinants of management turnover, strong evidence of greater CEO and CFO turnover was found among restating firms compared to the control sample. Restatement is the revision and subsequent publication of prior financial statements. Over the three years surrounding the year of restatement announcement, CEOs and CFOs, respectively, faced a 14% and 10% greater probability of being replaced if they worked at restating firms, as opposed to normal firms.
The role of accountants is to ensure that restatement enhances the financial reporting standards of the reporting entity, rather than being used for manipulative purposes.
What Is A Hidden Tax?
A hidden tax is one that is not visible to the taxpayer. It is mostly levied on a consumer goods without the knowledge of the final customers. This usually starts from the production process; the hidden taxes are levied on the goods during production which would in turn increase the cost of that good when it is sold. This is referred to as a hidden tax because the final customers have absolutely no knowledge of the existence of the tax or that they are paying a higher price for the goods.
Types Of Hidden Taxes
Corporate Income Tax:
Corporate income taxes are usually levied on a company's profits, the shareholders and employees, this ultimately reduces the amount they would get in form of salaries. The rate of this tax varies from country to country, it is usually not fixed.
Tariff / Import Tax:
Tariff or import taxes are levied on goods that are brought into a country. A tariff is a tax on imports or exports between sovereign states. The tax is imposed with the aim of encouraging and protecting domestic industry. It can also serve as a form of revenue for the government.
Sin Tax
The taxes levied on consumer goods that are deemed to be harmful to the society are called sin taxes. Examples of goods like these are cigarettes, fast food, gambling, pornography and alcohol. The taxes are enforced with the aim of reducing the purchase of these items as they can be harmful to the consumer in the long run.
There are other types of hidden taxes as well, especially prevalent in Australia is a luxury tax applied to highly priced cars.
