Monetary game: Accountants - Scorekeepers or players?

The accounting game is played on three fields:

1. Monetary item field
2. Variable item field
3. Constant item field

1. Monetary item game

This game is played in war conditions. The enemy player is inflation. The purpose of the game is to maintain the real value of money and at the same time to make a profit. Accountants value all items in the economy and are thus always players. By nature they are also always scorekeepers.

The enemy inflation is always destroying the real value of money and so is continuously scoring. It is impossible for the accountant to maintain the real value of money constant during the game (the current financial year) no matter which accounting model the accountant uses. The accountant and other members of his team use various tactics to make extra money or profit to make up for the real value that the enemy inflation is continuously destroying in the real value of money. The accountant, because of his or her training, is mostly the player used to place money on call, invest it on other short term or long term investments to at least equal inflation and to make a positive return. Accountants have the permanent task to keep the score during and after the game.

Accountants get invaluable help from the South African Reserve Bank team under the leadership of Tito the Great who wages a non-stop war against inflation throughout the country on all fronts.

Accountants are thus important players and always scorekeepers in the monetary item battle game against the enemy inflation.

People like SA accounting professors who claim that accountants are only scorekeepers and never players are thus dead wrong.


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