The Operative wrote:
There are many people that claim they are accountants, but are really not much more than entry-level bookkeepers. Some have no college education or may a two-year "accounting" degree from a community or technical college. Additionally, for the past several years, many states have increased requirements to match recommendations of the AICPA. The requirements are generally 150 semester credit hours of college education with a specified amount of accounting courses and a specified amount of business courses. While this particular person may have been able to take the CPA exam in the past with little or no education, they probably either didn't pass it or they didn't attempt it because they didn't need it for their job.
I became a CPA in Louisiana in the early 1980s. Even back then, a candidate in Louisiana had to have at least a bachelor's degree, 24 semester hour credits of specified accounting courses, and 6 hours of business law courses, before the State Board would even let you sit for the Uniform CPA examination. One guy in the firm had graduated from college in another state and had passed the CPA exam in that other state, but had taken the job in Louisiana without obtaining his CPA certificate, thinking he would just get the certificate in Louisiana after the move. He couldn't get the certificate in Louisiana - because he had had only 3 hours of business law courses in college in the other state. Although he had an accounting degree with enough accounting courses and had already passed the CPA exam, the Louisiana Board said: go get another 3 hours of business law, then we'll issue the certificate.
By the way, back
WHEN I TOOK THE EXAM (younger readers may now roll their eyes and brace themselves for a typical old geezer "
back when I was young we had it so much tougher than you kids do now" speech), the AICPA Uniform CPA exam was a 19 and a half hour test, given in four parts (or really five, if you count "Practice" as two parts) over a three day period - using only pencil and paper (no calculators of any kind). Today the exam is shorter, is given on computer, and calculators are allowed. Back then, the national rate to pass all exam parts on the first try was somewhere around 5% to 15% for first-time candidates. Many states (like Louisiana) required back then that you take all four parts out of the gate, so you couldn't take the easier approach of just study one part, pass it, then move on to the next part. Also, if you passed 3 parts but made a very low score on the fourth part, you were deemed to have passed none. START OVER! Also, at that time, the FASB (Financial Accounting Standards Board) was in the process of issuing lots of new accounting standards, and the Auditing Standards Board of the AICPA was issuing lots of new auditing standards, that were being tested on the CPA exam. Many candidates took the exam once and then gave up after seeing what they were up against.
The 150 hour rule did not come in until many years later.
"My greatest fear is that the audience will beat me to the punch line." -- David Mamet
