Accountants and Auditors
Examine, analyze, and interpret accounting records to prepare financial statements, give advice, or audit and evaluate statements prepared by others. Install or advise on systems of recording costs or other financial and budgetary data.
- Median pay
- $83,680
- Doing it now
- 1,595,200
- By 2035
- Up 5%
- Usually needs
- Bachelor's degree
a year
across the country
115,300 openings a year
to get in
What the work involves
- Prepare detailed reports on audit findings.
- Report to management about asset utilization and audit results, and recommend changes in operations and financial activities.
- Collect and analyze data to detect deficient controls, duplicated effort, extravagance, fraud, or non-compliance with laws, regulations, and management policies.
- Inspect account books and accounting systems for efficiency, effectiveness, and use of accepted accounting procedures to record transactions.
- Supervise auditing of establishments, and determine scope of investigation required.
- Confer with company officials about financial and regulatory matters.
- Examine and evaluate financial and information systems, recommending controls to ensure system reliability and data integrity.
What to study
The fields of study the Department of Education links to this occupation, most widely taught first.
- Accounting and Related ServicesSee 1,192 colleges that teach it
- Security Science and TechnologySee 201 colleges that teach it
- Accounting and Computer ScienceSee 3 colleges that teach it
- TaxationSee 3 colleges that teach it
Who it suits
O*NET scores every occupation on six interest dimensions. This one leans hardest on these three.
Organised and precise
Leading and persuading
Analytical and curious
Careers like this one
Where this comes from: the description and the task list are O*NET, which the Department of Labor maintains. Pay, workforce size, outlook and the education normally needed are the Bureau of Labor Statistics Employment Projections programme, 2025 wages and 2025 to 2035 projections. Half of them earn more than $83,680 a year, which means half earn less, and what you would earn depends on where you work and how long you have been doing it. The fields of study come from the National Center for Education Statistics crosswalk.