[Guti]

I received the below email from NASBA this morning. It pretty much says that now Indian students do not have to travel to the US to take the CPA exam as they can take it in Bahrain, Kuwait, Lebanon and the UAE.

Some Accounting jobs in South Florida have already been outsource by firms in India. The average accountant there gets pay around 10K per year. According to some American companies, Indian accountants were not well versed with Accounting laws and regulations. The clerical work like AP,AR on the other hand was easily outsourced for obvious reasons. Now with this new Law, there are going to be more CPAs in India than what we have in the US. Outsourcing will be a lot easier cause now you will have very competitive CPAs who understand GAAP,GAAS, and our IRS code at least on paper. To put this into perspective, I used to work in a 1.2 Billion dollar company. We had about 43 Accountant and only 5 CPAs. The salary range was from 50K to 150K. With this new law making it easier for Indian students to take the CPA exam, my old company could outsource to India and have 40 CPAs working with a range of 10K to 25K per year.Is this the beginning of the end for American CPAs working in private practice? I dont think Auditors could be outsourced.

Starting October 1, 2014, citizens, permanent residents and long-term residents of India can test for the Uniform CPA Examination in Bahrain, Kuwait, Lebanon and the UAE.

The CPA Examination application process is the same for U.S. and international candidates. In order to qualify to take the CPA Examination outside the U.S., candidates will have to establish their eligibility through an Accountancy Board participating in the International CPA Examination Administration program.

For a list of participating Accountancy Boards and information regarding international testing, please visit the International Administration of the CPA Exam page on our nasba.org website.

Prospective candidates must select the participating U.S. jurisdiction to which they will apply, contact the Accountancy Board (or its designee) in that jurisdiction to obtain application materials, submit completed applications and required fees as instructed, and once deemed qualified, register for the examination.

After receiving the Notice to Schedule, you may then register to take the examination in an international location and complete the International Administration of the CPA Exam through our Apply to Test Internationally page.

Once the International Administration process is complete, please visit Prometric’s website in order to schedule your examination in an available international test center location.

FAR-84
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BEC-

[zieba]

“Opening up our accounting market's not going to kill our careers. Sure, there may be some adjustments, but it'll hardly be “the end” for us.”

I don't think was really up to us as a sector, it's supply and demand economics. Besides, nobody outsources mission critical decision making. It's our job to rise up into a position which can be outsourced, but will likely be the last to go because you, having risen into an advisory position, provide more than generic reports

AUD - 75*, 88 done 5/14! (*exp)
BEC - 74 , 77
REG - 65 , 76 (10 point combooo!!)
FAR - 69 , 75

Dr: perseverance
Dr: intelligence
Dr: luck
. Cr: . advisory score

[justgivemea75]

I don't think that this is gloom and doom, but at the same time, I don't see the US standard of living that we've experienced since we rose as the de facto international power to stay this high forever (and it's already starting to deteriorate), so I don't think this is the beginning of the end, but rather that the slow, gradual decline is already beginning.

On the optimistic side, I don't think foreign CPAs can completely replace an american CPA. I haven't spent much time in public accounting (about to have my 1 month anniversary soon!) but from what I've seen, public accounting at least isn't much about raw intellectual horsepower like IT, engineering, or the other fields that have been maligned with outsourcing are. This is very much a people business and a lot more of the job is about soft-skills, such as dealing with a controller who can't be bothered with giving us the documentation and doing so without pissing off the client and losing your firm money (or losing your job!) or even being tolerable with your team so that the long engagements aren't completely miserable.

I don't mean to stereotype, but as an Indian-American myself, I can confirm that lots of kids I grew up with are a bit lacking in the soft-skills department and struggle to make connections with people who don't meet a very specific type. If you need someone to tell you when to capitalize interest on construction projects off the top of their head, you'll call my friends, but if senior associate needs me to be on a call with a followup documentation request, I'll be much further ahead than the peers I grew up with. That's not to say that being personable can't be learned, but I think that tech skills, particularly given how low the barrier is to be “passable” in our work is, are much more readily acquired.

Additionally, I think in a way this can be good because it's basically trade to enhance one's competitive advantages. Think of it this way: the Indian CPAs are likely going to get some of the crap that we hate doing: (i.e. controls testing, or anything else that is repetitive, time consuming and isn't really worth the billing hours of those who are more experienced). They are likely going to be much better at it than us but also much cheaper and will see an increase in their wages because of it (win for them). At the same time, this leaves us with more resources (time, people, capital, etc.) to pursue more challenging tasks, which is a win for us as well. Will there be less room at the entry-level, probably, but in a way that's a good thing. A higher barrier to entry will likely mean higher wages for those who do make it and will increase the “prestige” of the occupation since jobs will be harder to come by as well.

That being said, I think globalization is inevitable and the closer you are to the bottom, the more likely you will see your standard of living drop. The people at the top of any food chain will live large, but as you keep going down, more and more of your QoL will drop as global supply and demand moves toward a lower price point. If you think about it, our lifestyles in America are extremely wasteful (how many people you know throw away tons of food at the dinner table or constantly leave lights open with no regard for electricity, etc.) and we've been lucky to keep it without needing to work to hard to attain it, but that's changing rapidly as the rest of the world gets richer.

Therefore, I can imagine that those who are trying to break in 5-10 years from now will have more hoops to jump through. One person alluded to people needing to have the CPA or at least a few parts passed before getting a job at a Big 4 and I can easily see that happening.

FAR - 84
AUD - 76 (phew)
BEC - 88
REG - 77

DONE!

[Anonymous]

I actually don't know what that means

local accountants will be scanning paperwork for $30/hour to send it to India for review? Wait, they will be using ipad on wheels may be?

[ScarletKnightCPA]

Yeah they do have those IPAD on wheels actually.

see link:

https://www.businessinsider.com/double-robotics-2012-8

Might be the long term future of outsourcing audit work.

Far: 76 (Wiley Test Bank)
Aud: 77 (Wiley Test Bank)
Reg: 61, 76 (Wiley book, Wiley Test Bank)
Bec: 86 (Wiley Test Bank)

MBA in progress

[Anonymous]

This is hilarious, hologram is next

[Sir Study Alot]

Most large companies are becoming 100 percent electronic. The physical documents that the auditors are reviewing are usually printed from the computer. Many companies will be able to be audited overseas in the near future. Companies infrastructures are being shipped overseas as well making audits more likely to occur overseas. Its only a matter of time before small businesses are using a mainstream value network that completely automates AR and AP functions between businesses on the same network. As computer programs become more sophisticated and integrated month end and year end closing may become automated. The future auditor for fortune 500 companies will be 90 percent IT auditors and 10 percent big picture accounting specialists. There will still be accountant focused auditors that audit small businesses and government entities, but do not underestimate the affect that efficient accounting services like ADP will have on the profession.

Passed all 4 exams in 2014!

[Mary 2496]

I actually didn't know that they didn't offer it in India already. I know that the exam is offered internationally. I mean, when you look on the facebook page and other social media pages of a few of the big exam prep. pages, you see tons and tons of Indians saying “thank you for helping me pass the CPA exam.” It's already filled now with people from India (or many people with Indian names?) that have passed the exam.

[Herbieherb]

Holograms of dead rappers are being used already…holograms of CPAs in India is soon to be reality

NEW YORK- DONE

[Guti]

I just think that in about 5 to 10 years, if you are not a CPA, you wont have an Accounting job. I also think that salaries for CPAs in the US will drop just to be able to compete with outsiders. I guess that is the bad side of a Capitalist society. I always thought that Capitalism couldn't be that perfect. The flaws of Capitalism are beginning to show thanks to technology and globalization. Our middle class will shrink sooner than we expected.

FAR-84
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[Anonymous]

BarceFan,

As American middle class shrinks, salary of $9000/year becomes acceptable and those $10000/year jobs coming back from India haha

[Guti]

You got that right naranja.

FAR-84
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[Sir Study Alot]

@ anjanja

Yah that is one of the points that I had in the back of my mind. Some jobs will eventually come back here. However globalization treats the world like one economy and the result is that the middle class jobs will shift between economies until all of the major economies are competing at equal levels. The problem is that the wealthiest nations are the ones who will be losing wealth. Chaous will happen when the economies of the world equalize, because the war for natural resources will become even more intense. Natural resources will be the main factor that differentiates an industrial society. Soylent green anyone?

Passed all 4 exams in 2014!

[ScarletKnightCPA]

What's the point of economic growth if it is a race to the bottom, with it benefiting only a very small select few and hurts the vast majority*?

There will always be boots on the ground but these positions will shrink, become harder to get (family, friends, nepotism type thing more than it already is) and they will be more ‘spokespersons' and ‘faces' of the firm, which is already what a lot of it is presently.

*Majority of american's. The places that the jobs are exported to will tend to benefit. I guess you can argue that redistribution of the wealth from middle class west to the world is a positive in of itself

Far: 76 (Wiley Test Bank)
Aud: 77 (Wiley Test Bank)
Reg: 61, 76 (Wiley book, Wiley Test Bank)
Bec: 86 (Wiley Test Bank)

MBA in progress

[randerso]

I think the concern is a bit overblown. My husband makes tons of money as a computer engineer when there are Indian engineers willing to work for pennies on the dollar. Yes, a lot of the lower level engineering work is outsourced there. However, his firm often finds that Indian engineers lack important qualities for higher level work — education quality, internal drive, creativity, etc. I've got to imaging it's going to be similar for Indian CPAs.

REG: (May 2014) - 80 ✔
AUD: (Nov 2014) - 93 ✔
FAR: (Oct 2014) - 71, (Jan 2015) - 88 ✔
BEC: (Feb 2015) - 89 ✔

CA PETH: 94 percent

[Anonymous]

Right, it all will (or not?) eventually even out, but probably not in our lifetime, everything other than US, Canada, EU is too far behind.

We are world's major consumers, those iphones and uggs are not gonna buy themselves. If we (middle class) go down, all go down imo

[Author]

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