Surely, accountants ask themselves around the world, we could make everyone's lives simpler? If only we could get back to principles and away from rules, we would be able to express financial results in a much more obvious, logical and understandable way. And if only we could express the figures more simply and not produce page after page of impenetrable jargon, investors and the public generally would stand and cheer us in the streets.rnAnd like many of the 'if onlys' in life, it is terribly hard to do. Conrad Hewitt, the then chief accountant at the US regulatory body, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the much feared SEC, expressed it well in an interview last year. 'I grew up when we had principles,' he said. 'When I started in the profession, what we had was principles. And then it developed into a rules-based profession. I do believe that principles-based standards is the better of therntwo.' You can hear a certain wistfulness there, a feeling that once upon a time there had been a more innocent age, when accountants were clearer about what they did and investors had a better handle on their understanding of financial reporting.
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