Pros and Cons of accounting
I cant think of why someone would do accounting. Is making partners easier? Are there insane benefits?
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to compare accounting's pros to finance:
(1) You actually like accounting work.
(2) You want a much greater chance at sticking to your chosen field. You pretty much have to try to not have an accounting job if you are a CPA. On the other hand, if you move jobs as a finance professional it is far more likely that you are going to move into a non-finance role. This isn't to say that you will move into a non-finance role, just that finance to non-finance is far more likely than accounting to non-accounting. It is a probability thing.
There is a dire need for accountants. The amount of accounting work that needs to get done is massive. Accounting firms, companies, non-profits, the government, everyone just needs more accountants. Yet the talent pipeline is not there. There are just not enough accountants leaving college every year. College is just generally more expensive now-a-days and you effectively need to have a CPA license which means 5 years of school (unless you are psychopathic enough to get it in 4 years like me) because you need 150 credit hours on the semester system. an individual role's job security is generally much better in accounting than in finance, and the ability to find another accounting job is much easier than to find another finance job.
(3) Accounting generally has substantially better work-life balance. To the extent you do work those long finance hours, they are almost always well-defined, and you have notice far in advance. For example, tax season doesn't change. I can tell you when tax season will be 20 years from now. Audits happen at mostly standardized times. You are talking either calendar end or the government's fiscal year end in September. That accounts for the overwhelming majority of year ends, which is what audits are based around. The default pace of accounting work is far more predictable and that's the key thing when it comes to WLB. Long hours aren't a WLB destroyer in and of itself. It is long, unpredictable hours that destroys WLB. Finance has that in spades. Accounting barely does.
(4) Most work that gets labeled as accounting jobs are actually accounting jobs. "Finance" labeled jobs are often NOT actually finance jobs. For example, most finance labeled jobs at a company are not really finance jobs, they are often glorified accounting jobs. Take treasury, for example.
(5) You get good, but generally not great, pay. Finance professionals will generally make more. Most finance professionals won't make much more than the comparable accounting professional, but there is a pay gap there. But on an absolute basis, there is nothing wrong with the accounting compensation.
I started my career as an accountant and currently work as an investment banker.
Pros: Accounting is a great career option if you i) enjoy it and ii) are good enough to make partner. Making partner at an accounting firm is such an underrated gig - “average” partners in the middle of their careers make high 6 figures. And you can more or less “chill” with your book of clients as it’s essentially a recurring revenue stream; you don’t need to be constantly hunting for new deals like a MD.
Cons: the pay before partner level is borderline criminal. People think IB pays badly on a per hour basis, Big4 accounting is worse. I remember a lot of us had to live with our parents after graduating school because our big 4 accounting job didn’t pay enough for us to afford our own place… wild stuff.
The work is also pretty boring. Again, people in IB often complain about the work being soul-sucking but comparatively speaking, auditing is like watching paint dry.
Your “product” to society is essentially a stamp of approval that your client’s financial statements are legitimate. In IB you help companies make transformational deals.
This take is not shared by everyone, but imo investment bankers are more driven/intelligent on the whole (not in all cases). In my experience, if you meet a current/former banker they’re almost always at least somewhat intelligent. I’ve seen some great people come through the Big4 but also a lot of braindead dumb-dumbs.
Having experienced both fields, I think IB is the “better” short term experience all things being equal. However, in the long term if you like accounting and make partner, you’ll be better off than at least half of people who started in finance initially and washed out to some random field.
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