Cost stickiness revisited: Empirical aplication for farms

This article reviews previous research regarding cost stickiness and performs an empirical analysis applied to a sample of farms. It recognizes that modelization of cost stickiness is a particular case of representation of cost variations as a function of output variations. It also discusses methodological issues and analyses cost stickiness for all registered farm costs and opportunity costs of family work. Costs exhibit a considerable level of rigidity. Even for variable costs, a decrease in activity involves a lower decrease in costs than the amounts involved when activity increases. While registered indirect costs slightly decrease when activity decreases, opportunity costs always increase. The study provides empirical evidence that cost stickiness is significantly reduced with better management decision practices.cost stickiness, cost behavior, farm management accounting

Driver costs in small firms: empirical analysis for farms

The agricultural sector has always been characterized by a predominance of small firms. International competition and the consequent need for restraining costs are permanent challenges for farms. This paper performs an empirical investigation of cost behavior in agriculture using panel data analysis. Our results show that transactions caused by complexity influence farm costs with opposite effects for specific and indirect costs. While transactions allow economies of scale in specific costs, they significantly increase indirect costs. However, the main driver for farm costs is volume. In addition, important differences exist for small and big farms, since transactional variables significantly influence the former but not the latter. While sophisticated management tools, such ABC, could provide only limited complementary useful information but no essential allocation bases for farms, they seem inappropriate for small farms.small firms, activity based costing, cost behavior, farm management accounting

Accounting Research: a Critical View of the Present Situation and Prospects

In this study we critically review the internal procedures of the accounting community for generating and disseminating knowledge. We contend that academic journals on accounting research are scarce, publish few articles and apply high rejection rates, and the review process is lengthy and expensive. Additionally, an academic elite has unparalleled predominance in comparison to other business disciplines, reflected in an unusual share of published articles with authors affiliated to a small number of academic institutions, and the predominance of certain topics and methodologies. The discipline does not allow the collaborative, iterative and flexible features of innovative knowledge communities. The discipline’s internal procedures favour restriction, control, slowness, and expiration, rather than participation, speed and renewal. They are ill suited for advancing knowledge and bode badly for successful research. As a result, accounting academics present low research performance and the discipline is facing steady decline. More importantly, the discipline is handicapped in producing innovative knowledge able to contribute to critical research and long term social well-being.We also focus on the Spanish institutional situation, arguing that Spanish requirements for reaching tenured positions are difficult for accountants to meet.We highlight the need to raise awareness of the problem and change the procedures.En este estudio hacemos una revisión crítica de los procedimientos vigentes en la comunidad académica contable para la generación de conocimiento y su publicación. Exponemos que hay pocas revistas académicas para publicar la investigación contable, que éstas publican pocos artículos, aplican elevadas tasas de rechazo y el proceso de revisión es lento y costoso. Además, hay un predominio de una elite académica sin precedentes en otras disciplinas de empresa, lo cual se refleja en un mayor porcentaje de artículos pertenecientes a autores afiliados a un pequeño número de instituciones académicas, y el predominio de ciertos temas y metodologías.La disciplina no presenta los rasgos de colaboración, interactividad y flexibilidad propios de las comunidades dinámicas e innovadoras en la producción de conocimiento. El funcionamiento de la disciplina está más orientado al control que al avance del conocimiento.Los procedimientos seguidos en la disciplina no son los más apropiados para favorecer el éxito en la investigación. En consecuencia, los académicos contables presentan poca producción investigadora y tienen dificultades para desarrollar con éxito una carrera investigadora. Lo que es aún más importante, la disciplina ofrece pocas posibilidades de generar investigación crítica en cuestiones sociales y medioambientales.Este trabajo analiza también la situación institucional en España, aduciendo que los requisitos exigidos para alcanzar posiciones de estabilidad académica son difíciles de conseguir para los académicos que se dedican a la contabilidad.Ponemos de relieve la necesidad de tomar conciencia del problema, como primer paso para cambiar el funcionamiento de la disciplina

Return autocorrelation anomalies and the importance of non-trading periods: evidence from Spain, France and Germany

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Investigación en contabilidad: una visión crítica de la situación actual y perspectivas

In this study we critically review the internal procedures of the accounting community for generating and disseminating knowledge. We contend that academic journals on accounting research are scarce, publish few articles and apply high rejection rates, and the review process is lengthy and expensive. Additionally, an academic elite has unparalleled predominance in comparison to other business disciplines, reflected in an unusual share of published articles with authors affiliated to a small number of academic institutions, and the predominance of certain topics and methodologies. The discipline does not allow the collaborative, iterative and flexible features of innovative knowledge communities. The discipline’s internal procedures favour restriction, control, slowness, and expiration, rather than participation, speed and renewal. They are ill suited for advancing knowledge and bode badly for successful research. As a result, accounting academics present low research performance and the discipline is facing steady decline. More importantly, the discipline is handicapped in producing innovative knowledge able to contribute to critical research and long term social well-being. We also focus on the Spanish institutional situation, arguing that Spanish requirements for reaching tenured positions are difficult for accountants to meet. We highlight the need to raise awareness of the problem and change the proceduresEn este estudio hacemos una revisión crítica de los procedimientos vigentes en la comunidad académica contable para la generación de conocimiento y su publicación. Exponemos que hay pocas revistas académicas para publicar la investigación contable, que éstas publican pocos artículos, aplican elevadas tasas de rechazo y el proceso de revisión es lento y costoso. Además, hay un predominio de una elite académica sin precedentes en otras disciplinas de empresa, lo cual se refleja en un mayor porcentaje de artículos pertenecientes a autores afiliados a un pequeño número de instituciones académicas, y el predominio de ciertos temas y metodologías. La disciplina no presenta los rasgos de colaboración, interactividad y flexibilidad propios de las comunidades dinámicas e innovadoras en la producción de conocimiento. El funcionamiento de la disciplina está más orientado al control que al avance del conocimiento. Los procedimientos seguidos en la disciplina no son los más apropiados para favorecer el éxito en la investigación. En consecuencia, los académicos contables presentan poca producción investigadora y tienen dificultades para desarrollar con éxito una carrera investigadora. Lo que es aún más importante, la disciplina ofrece pocas posibilidades de generar investigación crítica en cuestiones sociales y medioambientales. Este trabajo analiza también la situación institucional en España, aduciendo que los requisitos exigidos para alcanzar posiciones de estabilidad académica son difíciles de conseguir para los académicos que se dedican a la contabilidad. Ponemos de relieve la necesidad de tomar conciencia del problema, como primer paso para cambiar el funcionamiento de la disciplina

Efecto de la duración del contrato de auditoría en la recepción de informes cualificados: nueva evidencia para el mercado español: Audit firm tenure and qualified opinions: New evidence from Spain

The 2010 Green Paper on Audit Policy by the European Commission has explicitly questioned the sufficiency of audit rotation rules established by European Union Members to guarantee auditor independence. In addition, the Paper clearly states that more research is needed regarding the effects of long audit tenures on independence. In this article, we have replicated the research by Ruiz-Barbadillo, Gómez-Aguilar, and Biedma (2005) about the effects of audit firm tenure on independence with more updated data. However, unlike them, we have performed panel data estimations instead of pooled regression. Our approach allows for a better control of individual unobserved heterogeneity, thus reducing potential problems caused by omitted variable bias. While Ruiz-Barbadillo et al. reported an unexpected positive effect of tenure on the likelihood of audit qualifications, we do not show any significant effect of tenure on the opinion of the audit report. Our results are robust to various sensitivity analyses.El Libro Verde sobre Política de Auditoría elaborado por la Comisión Europea en 2010ha puesto en duda la suficiencia del marco regulatorio actual de la auditoría vigente en la Unión Europea para garantizar adecuadamente la independencia del auditor. Además, el documento reconoce explícitamente la necesidad de más investigación sobre los efectos en la independencia del auditor de relaciones de auditoría que se perpetúan en el tiempo. En este artículo, hemos replicado, con datos más actuales, la investigación de Ruiz-Barbadillo et al. Sin embargo, a diferencia de ellos, hemos utilizado un enfoque de datos de panel en lugar de una regresión agrupada. Nuestra aproximación permite controlar mejor los problemas derivados de la heterogeneidad no observada, reduciendo los problemas de sesgo debido a la omisión de variables. Ruiz-Barbadillo et al. obtuvieron el resultado inesperado que a mayor número de años auditados por un mismo auditor más probable era que el informe de auditoría presentara salvedades. Nuestros resultados, por el contrario, no muestran ningún efecto significativo de la duración de la relación con el auditor en la opinión del informe de auditoría. Los resultados obtenidos son robustos a los análisis de sensibilidad que se han realizado

Audit firm tenure and qualified opinions: New evidence from Spain

The 2010 Green Paper on Audit Policy by the European Commission has explicitly questioned the sufficiency of audit rotation rules established by European Union Members to guarantee auditor independence. In addition, the Paper clearly states that more research is needed regarding the effects of long audit tenures on independence. In this article, we have replicated the research by Ruiz-Barbadillo, Gómez-Aguilar, and Biedma (2005) about the effects of audit firm tenure on independence with more updated data. However, unlike them, we have performed panel data estimations instead of pooled regression. Our approach allows for a better control of individual unobserved heterogeneity, thus reducing potential problems caused by omitted variable bias. While Ruiz-Barbadillo et al. reported an unexpected positive effect of tenure on the likelihood of audit qualifications, we do not show any significant effect of tenure on the opinion of the audit report. Our results are robust to various sensitivity analyses

Valor razonable versus coste histórico de los activos biológicos: valor predictivo de la información contable

There is an intense debate on the convenience of moving from historical cost (HC) toward the fair value (FV) principle. The debate and academic research is usually concerned with financial instruments, but the IAS 41 requirement of fair valuation for biological assets brings it into the agricultural domain. This paper performs an empirical study with a sample of Spanish farms valuing biological assets at HC and a sample applying FV, finding no significant differences between both valuation methods to assess future cash flows. However, most tests reveal more predictive power of future earnings under fair valuation of biological assets, which is not explained by differences in volatility of earnings and profitability. The study also evidences the existence of flawed HC accounting practices for biological assets in agriculture, which suggests scarce information content of this valuation method in the predominant small business units existing in the agricultural sector in advanced Western countriesLa evolución de la contabilidad desde el coste histórico (CH) hacia el valor razonable (VR) ha suscitado debates y controversias, tanto en el ámbito profesional, como en el académico. Si bien el debate y los estudios se han referido principalmente a los instrumentos financieros, el requerimiento de la NIC41 de valorar los activos biológicos al VR ha ampliado el debate a la contabilidad agrícola. Este trabajo realiza un estudio empírico mediante una muestra de explotaciones agrícolas españolas que valoran sus activos biológicos al CH y otra que valoran al VR, para comparar el poder predictivo de ambos criterios de valoración. No se encuentran diferencias significativas entre ambos criterios para la predicción de los futuros flujos de tesorería. No obstante, la mayor parte de los tests realizados revelan un mayor poder predictivo de los futuros resultados contables bajo el valor razonable, que no se explica en función de diferencias en la volatilidad. El estudio evidencia también la existencia de prácticas defectuosas de cálculo del CH por parte de las explotaciones agrícolas, lo cual sugiere un escaso contenido informativo de la contabilidad bajo este criterio dado el universo de pequeñas explotaciones familiares predominantes en los países occidentales avanzados

Accounting Research: A Critical View Of The Present Situation And Prospects

In this study we critically review the internal procedures of the accounting community for generating and disseminating knowledge. We contend that academic journals on accounting research are scarce, publish few articles and apply high rejection rates, and the review process is lengthy and expensive. Additionally, an academic elite has unparalleled predominance in comparison to other business disciplines, reflected in an unusual share of published articles with authors affiliated to a small number of academic institutions, and the predominance of certain topics and methodologies. The discipline does not allow the collaborative, iterative and flexible features of innovative knowledge communities. The discipline's internal procedures favour restriction, control, slowness, and expiration, rather than participation, speed and renewal. They are ill suited for advancing knowledge and bode badly for successful research. As a result, accounting academics present low research performance and the discipline is facing steady decline. More importantly, the discipline is handicapped in producing innovative knowledge able to contribute to critical research and long term social well-being. We also focus on the Spanish institutional situation, arguing that Spanish requirements for reaching tenured positions are difficult for accountants to meet. We highlight the need to raise awareness of the problem and change the procedures