As standard setters try to steer the accounting profession toward a more principles-based approach to accounting rules, the rule makers and their advisors continue to wrestle with how to achieve the shift and how much implementation guidance to offer along the way.
In the latest annual survey of the Financial Accounting Standards Advisory Council, which oversees the Financial Accounting Standards Board, the Board got an abundance of advice on how to achieve the shift to a simplified, more principles-based system of accounting. Among them: field test new standards before finalizing them; pay more attention to the objectives of standards and the underlying economics; pay more attention to cost-benefit considerations; use simpler language; and offer more examples.
