Talent Retakes the Top Spot as the Biggest Concern for CPA Decision Makers in AICPA Survey

Posted on by Adrienne Gonzalez
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Journal of Accountancy has written about the results of the Business and Industry Economic Outlook Survey from AICPA & CIMA, a quarterly effort that takes the temperature of CPA decision-makers — mostly CFOs, CEOs, and controllers — to find out what they think about business and economic challenges inside and out of their organization.

The headline: Inflation no longer the top challenge for CPA decision-makers, survey shows

Whew, finally.

45 percent of respondents are optimistic about their business, up from 35 percent in the last survey. Almost a third (29 percent) are optimistic about the US economy, a huge jump from 14 percent last quarter. Respondents’ outlook on the global economy remains a bit low but improving; 17 percent of respondents are optimistic, up from 11 percent last quarter.

Increased optimism about the economy aside, concerns about inflation and interest rates are influencing a “measured approach to hiring.”

Half of respondents say their organizations have the right number of employees, up four percentage points from the second quarter. One-fourth say they plan to add workers, and 14% say they would like to hire but are hesitant to do so, down from 17% who expressed that hesitancy in the second quarter.

One obstacle in leaders’ hiring plans is finding workers. Availability of skilled personnel is now the No. 1 challenge leaders face — moving up three spots from the second quarter and knocking inflation out of the top spot, which it held for seven consecutive quarters. The rest of the top five challenges this quarter are inflation, domestic economic conditions, employee and benefits costs, and staff turnover.

Compare this to last quarter’s JofA write-up:

Views on hiring have shifted slightly since last quarter, too. Forty-six percent of respondents believe they have the right number of employees, up 1 point from the first quarter. Hesitancy to hire saw a 6-point jump to 17%, and 26% have plans to boost their workforce, a decrease from 33% in the first quarter.

This is the first time in more than a year that inflation has not been the biggest concern for these decision-makers.

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Priests Snitch on C Street Center to IRS for ‘Masquerading as a Church’

In case you’re not familiar, C Street is the destination spot for washed up, morally-tainted Republican All-Stars like South Carolina governor Mark Sanford post-Appalachain Trail (it’s called “decompression” and I suppose I’d do it too if I was hooked on an exotic South American beauty that wasn’t my wife) and Mississippi’s Chip Pickering who used the C Street facilities to entertain his mistress.

At least Sanford is classy enough to claim he was there for spiritual advice after his wife found out and started planning her book tour.


I guess we know what the C stands for (hint: it ends in “U Next Tuesday”) and there’s plenty of it running around the joint. Must be all that awesome Bible study.

WaPo:

The owners of a $1.8 million townhouse on Capitol Hill that has been home and refuge to conservative members of Congress are wrongly claiming a federal tax exemption reserved for religious establishments, 13 Ohio clergy members contend in a complaint to the Internal Revenue Service.

The clergy suspect that the C Street Center, which rents living space to lawmakers, is “an exclusive club for powerful officials . . . masquerading as a church,” according to a request for an investigation addressed to IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman.

The questionable spirituality of C Street is nothing new but this is the first time real live priests have taken to snitching to front off the “organization”. Jim DeMint (another South Carolina Republican) defended the place (though mentioned nothing about whether or not he’d do Sanford’s mistress) saying, “We kind of make that commitment to each other to get together once a week. Sometimes it’s a Bible study; we always have a spiritual or scriptural thought. But sometimes we just talk about each others’ lives, try to get to know each other, remind each other that we are not important, that it’s just a title.”

How about lying, cheating, fake non-profit-status-having family values hypocrites? Is that just a title?

What’s up with C Street? Religious group for morally bankrupt politicians at the end of their rope seeking comfort and companionship or fundamentalist flophouse? I guess that’s for the Service to decide.

So far it doesn’t look good for our merry bunch of can’t-keep-it-in-their-pants GOPers, as DC already revoked 66% of C Street’s property tax exemption last year due to the fact that 66% of the facility was used as a residence and not a church.

Does getting on your knees count for that other 34%? Hallelujah and yay conservative family values!

Nonprofits Could be Forced to Pay to Save the Postal Service

It’s difficult to find numbers that don’t contradict each other, some reports say nonprofits are doing better than expected in this uncertain economic environment while others insist it’s still rough out there, especially for organizations that rely on donations to get by. For nonprofits, it doesn’t matter how the year is going, it may soon cost more to send out those pleading donation mailers.

The Postal Regulatory Commission is looking at a 2 cent increase for first class mail, an 8% increase for periodicals (just what the doctor ordered for struggling print publications) and a 23% increase on parcels. While they have not specifically mentioned an increase in nonprofit mailer pricing, the PRC has already identified certain “underwater” mail classes, non-profit mail being one such case.


As is, authorized nonprofits get a price break of about 40% over commercial mail prices so you could see why a struggling USPS might go straight for non-profits when looking for additional revenue sources to close its $7 billion budget gap.

Overall, postal prices are expected to rise 4 – 5%, a huge jump from the legally allowed .6% the Postal Service can use to adjust for inflation. Seeing as how we supposedly haven’t experienced any inflation this year, the jump is that much more disheartening to mass mailers.

Not surprisingly, there’s a nonprofit set up to focus on postal issues around nonprofit mail and they’re all over it. Said Tony Cooper of the Washington-based Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers, the USPS delivery system “is a system that’s built to handle about 300 billion pieces of mail, and they’ve got about 170 billion, and it’s set to decrease. It’s basically twice as big as it needs to be. It’s that excess capacity and costs that are creating the need in their minds to do this.” Hear that, USPS? Cut the fat before you start going after the little guys.

Adrienne Gonzalez is the founder of Jr. Deputy Accountant, a former CPA wrangler and a Going Concern contributor. You can see more of her posts here and all posts on the CPA Exam here.

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