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AICPA looks to ease accountant shortage in public sector

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The American Institute of CPAs teamed up with the National Association of State Auditors, Comptrollers and Treasurers on a joint report calling attention to the urgent need for accountants in state and local governments.

The report points to the talent shortage that’s affecting not only accounting firms and private sector businesses, but the public sector as well. It recommends a number of possible remedies, such as educating legislative bodies about the value of the CPA, offering competitive salaries for CPAs in government and fees paid to outside auditors, and reviewing the thresholds that trigger certain kinds of audits.

“We have a talent shortage in accounting that affects business as a whole, and many of the pipeline initiatives the profession is putting in place will help the public sector as well,” said Susan Coffey, the AICPA’s CEO of public accounting, in a statement last week. “But accountants who do government work face unique challenges that require more specialized solutions. The public deserves to know its tax dollars are being spent as intended — and that requires strong government finance teams and experienced auditors.”

The AICPA's Sue Coffey addressing Engage 2023

The AICPA’s Sue Coffey addressing Engage 2023

The AICPA has also been pursuing efforts to encourage more young people to join the accounting profession. In May, an independent panel convened by the AICPA, the National Pipeline Advisory Group, delivered a series of recommendations in its Accounting Talent Solutions Draft Report on addressing the accounting talent shortage. Those recommendations were later discussed by a panel at the AICPA Engage Conference in June.

The new report points out that government and private sector accounting and auditing standards often differ, so CPAs who work in the public sector require specialized expertise. However, salaries and audit fees are often well below those offered in the private sector, the report found. State and local governments don’t always understand the value CPAs bring to finance teams and the audit process, so hiring is often driven by a cost-savings approach, without recognizing the qualifications that an experienced staff accountant or outside auditor could bring.

Salary is a big hurdle. The report recommends making government pay more competitive with the private sector. Government entities should use the available data to benchmark salaries for CPAs against similar positions in the public and private sectors and consider options for remote or hybrid work and flexible hours.

Colleges and universities should increase the number of classes that address governmental topics and work to build relationships with government entities to increase their visibility on campus, the report recommends. State and local governments should support internships, mentorships and financial incentives for accountants who want to work in government and pursue a CPA.

CPA firms should emphasize to staff that working in the government practice is a good career path and adopt a staffing model that allows staff to specialize in governmental audits year-round without having to work additional hours during the more traditional busy season.

“We’re urging a renewed investment in public-sector accounting and auditing by state and local governments and CPA firms,” said NASACT executive director Kinney Poynter in a statement. “Trust in government requires governments to prepare clear, consistent financial data that is backed by a strong audit function. It’s essential we make this a priority.”

The report recommends aligning and simplifying accounting and auditing standards. Regulators should minimize differences in accounting and audit standards for the government and private sectors, and standard-setters should more routinely sound out smaller governmental entities on the impact of proposed standards, the report suggests.

Federal and state governments should periodically review audit threshold requirements and consider offering audit alternatives for smaller governmental entities that would still provide accountability (such as reviews, agreed-upon procedures or compliance examinations).

States should consider ways to provide accounting and auditing resources and/or financial assistance to local governments to help them prepare for and undergo a timely audit.

When considering outside auditors, governments should look at CPA firm qualifications, not only the proposed fees, according to the report. And to broaden the pool of potential auditors, government entities should consider eliminating geographical limitations on permissible firms.

State governments should develop a program for legislative bodies and government officials (at both the state and local levels) to explain the CPA value proposition and the need for qualified, competitively paid accounting, auditing and finance functions, as well as the risks of failing to make that investment.

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IAASB tweaks standards on working with outside experts

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The International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board is proposing to tailor some of its standards to align with recent additions to the International Ethics Standards Board for Accountants’ International Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants when it comes to using the work of an external expert.

The proposed narrow-scope amendments involve minor changes to several IAASB standards:

  • ISA 620, Using the Work of an Auditor’s Expert;
  • ISRE 2400 (Revised), Engagements to Review Historical Financial Statements;
  • ISAE 3000 (Revised), Assurance Engagements Other than Audits or Reviews of Historical Financial Information;
  • ISRS 4400 (Revised), Agreed-upon Procedures Engagements.

The IAASB is asking for comments via a digital response template that can be found on the IAASB website by July 24, 2025.

In December 2023, the IESBA approved an exposure draft for proposed revisions to the IESBA’s Code of Ethics related to using the work of an external expert. The proposals included three new sections to the Code of Ethics, including provisions for professional accountants in public practice; professional accountants in business and sustainability assurance practitioners. The IESBA approved the provisions on using the work of an external expert at its December 2024 meeting, establishing an ethical framework to guide accountants and sustainability assurance practitioners in evaluating whether an external expert has the necessary competence, capabilities and objectivity to use their work, as well as provisions on applying the Ethics Code’s conceptual framework when using the work of an outside expert.  

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Tariffs will hit low-income Americans harder than richest, report says

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President Donald Trump’s tariffs would effectively cause a tax increase for low-income families that is more than three times higher than what wealthier Americans would pay, according to an analysis from the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy.

The report from the progressive think tank outlined the outcomes for Americans of all backgrounds if the tariffs currently in effect remain in place next year. Those making $28,600 or less would have to spend 6.2% more of their income due to higher prices, while the richest Americans with income of at least $914,900 are expected to spend 1.7% more. Middle-income families making between $55,100 and $94,100 would pay 5% more of their earnings. 

Trump has imposed the steepest U.S. duties in more than a century, including a 145% tariff on many products from China, a 25% rate on most imports from Canada and Mexico, duties on some sectors such as steel and aluminum and a baseline 10% tariff on the rest of the country’s trading partners. He suspended higher, customized tariffs on most countries for 90 days.

Economists have warned that costs from tariff increases would ultimately be passed on to U.S. consumers. And while prices will rise for everyone, lower-income families are expected to lose a larger portion of their budgets because they tend to spend more of their earnings on goods, including food and other necessities, compared to wealthier individuals.

Food prices could rise by 2.6% in the short run due to tariffs, according to an estimate from the Yale Budget Lab. Among all goods impacted, consumers are expected to face the steepest price hikes for clothing at 64%, the report showed. 

The Yale Budget Lab projected that the tariffs would result in a loss of $4,700 a year on average for American households.

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At Schellman, AI reshapes a firm’s staffing needs

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Artificial intelligence is just getting started in the accounting world, but it is already helping firms like technology specialist Schellman do more things with fewer people, allowing the firm to scale back hiring and reduce headcount in certain areas through natural attrition. 

Schellman CEO Avani Desai said there have definitely been some shifts in headcount at the Top 100 Firm, though she stressed it was nothing dramatic, as it mostly reflects natural attrition combined with being more selective with hiring. She said the firm has already made an internal decision to not reduce headcount in force, as that just indicates they didn’t hire properly the first time. 

“It hasn’t been about reducing roles but evolving how we do work, so there wasn’t one specific date where we ‘started’ the reduction. It’s been more case by case. We’ve held back on refilling certain roles when we saw opportunities to streamline, especially with the use of new technologies like AI,” she said. 

One area where the firm has found such opportunities has been in the testing of certain cybersecurity controls, particularly within the SOC framework. The firm examined all the controls it tests on the service side and asked which ones require human judgment or deep expertise. The answer was a lot of them. But for the ones that don’t, AI algorithms have been able to significantly lighten the load. 

“[If] we don’t refill a role, it’s because the need actually has changed, or the process has improved so significantly [that] the workload is lighter or shared across the smarter system. So that’s what’s happening,” said Desai. 

Outside of client services like SOC control testing and reporting, the firm has found efficiencies in administrative functions as well as certain internal operational processes. On the latter point, Desai noted that Schellman’s engineers, including the chief information officer, have been using AI to help develop code, which means they’re not relying as much on outside expertise on the internal service delivery side of things. There are still people in the development process, but their roles are changing: They’re writing less code, and doing more reviewing of code before it gets pushed into production, saving time and creating efficiencies. 

“The best way for me to say this is, to us, this has been intentional. We paused hiring in a few areas where we saw overlaps, where technology was really working,” said Desai.

However, even in an age awash with AI, Schellman acknowledges there are certain jobs that need a human, at least for now. For example, the firm does assessments for the FedRAMP program, which is needed for cloud service providers to contract with certain government agencies. These assessments, even in the most stable of times, can be long and complex engagements, to say nothing of the less predictable nature of the current government. As such, it does not make as much sense to reduce human staff in this area. 

“The way it is right now for us to do FedRAMP engagements, it’s a very manual process. There’s a lot of back and forth between us and a third party, the government, and we don’t see a lot of overall application or technology help… We’re in the federal space and you can imagine, [with] what’s going on right now, there’s a big changing market condition for clients and their pricing pressure,” said Desai. 

As Schellman reduces staff levels in some places, it is increasing them in others. Desai said the firm is actively hiring in certain areas. In particular, it’s adding staff in technical cybersecurity (e.g., penetration testers), the aforementioned FedRAMP engagements, AI assessment (in line with recently becoming an ISO 42001 certification body) and in some client-facing roles like marketing and sales. 

“So, to me, this isn’t about doing more with less … It’s about doing more of the right things with the right people,” said Desai. 

While these moves have resulted in savings, she said that was never really the point, so whatever the firm has saved from staffing efficiencies it has reinvested in its tech stack to build its service line further. When asked for an example, she said the firm would like to focus more on penetration testing by building a SaaS tool for it. While Schellman has a proof of concept developed, she noted it would take a lot of money and time to deploy a full solution — both of which the firm now has more of because of its efficiency moves. 

“What is the ‘why’ behind these decisions? The ‘why’ for us isn’t what I think you traditionally see, which is ‘We need to get profitability high. We need to have less people do more things.’ That’s not what it is like,” said Desai. “I want to be able to focus on quality. And the only way I think I can focus on quality is if my people are not focusing on things that don’t matter … I feel like I’m in a much better place because the smart people that I’ve hired are working on the riskiest and most complicated things.”

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