Beans. Accountants count them. The artistry of counting beans is called accounting. Yes, you may laugh at the Nyquil ZZZ-sponsored sounding career, but five years from now, odds are very high we'll still need accountants. With the same certainty, we can't believe that there will be a need for stamping machines to create those spinny-fidget gadgets. But there will be need for accountants to add up the bankruptcies.

Related or Semi-related Video

Finance: What is Accrual Accounting?39 Views

00:00

Finance a la shmoop... what is accrual accounting? well there are two

00:07

religions in the way in which beans get counted the first is cash accounting [Cash accounting building]

00:12

which just tracks cash in the door and cash out the door in any given period [Cash enters door and exits]

00:17

the second is accrual accounting which tries to guess or impute the values

00:23

coming in and going out in a given firm hoping to give a true picture of how

00:27

well or poorly a company is performing financially and you might ask how cash

00:32

and accrual accounting can be different like aren't beans just beans that you

00:36

count well stay tuned here in accrual accounting you might have an obligation

00:41

like an employee bonus which you think is highly likely to be paid at the end [Employee happy at getting a bonus]

00:47

of the year almost treated like debt the employee makes 6 grand a month and is

00:52

very likely due 10 grand in bonus money at the end of the year it's payable on

00:56

December 31 that's when the cash would go out the door of the company but given [Cash exiting the door]

01:01

that it's highly likely to be paid or earned by the employee so they'd have a

01:06

legal claim on that 10 grand the company using accrual accounting would accrue

01:12

the liability labeled something like bonuses or or is it bony well something

01:18

like that bonus is payable.. and would accrue the

01:22

value of 10 grand divided by 12 because that's the number of months in a year in

01:26

California anyway or about 833 dollars a month throughout the year that's how you [Employee bonus divided by 12 months calculation]

01:31

would accrue for that likely bonus now promising an employee a bonus and not

01:35

giving it to them after they've earned it well that would be a cruel accounting [Person holds out cash to employee and takes it away]

01:40

a totally different thing and much more mean-spirited

Up Next

Finance: What is Adverse Audit Opinion?
27 Views

What is Adverse Audit Opinion? An adverse audit opinion signals that an auditor has found flaws in a company’s financial statements. Adverse audi...

Finance: What are Insider Trading And the Securities Fraud Enforcement Act Of 1988?
11 Views

What is insider trading and the Securities Fraud Enforcement Act of 1988? It's nothing too complicated, if this minute long video is any indication.

Finance: What is Hiding Written Complaints?
2 Views

The act of hiding written complaints is...no bueno. An investment rep is legally obligated to pass on any such complaints to their employer.

Find other enlightening terms in Shmoop Finance Genius Bar(f)