Double-entry bookkeeping (DEB) is used by most large firms even though scholars do not understand why they chose DEB. We address three questions about DEB’s gradual displacement of single-entry bookkeeping (SEB): (1) What is the main benefit of DEB? (2) How did DEB emerge and evolve? and (3)...

Ramanna (this issue) argues that the FASB’s new Conceptual Framework deemphasizes reliability in favor of representational faithfulness to facilitate the FASB’s promotion of an “asset-liability” approach measured at fair values. More importantly, Ramanna argues that this change is likely...

Over the last decade, there has been much empirical research on Chinese accounting conservatism. This research started with Ball, Robin and Wu (2000) that was one of the first papers to apply modern research methods to Chinese data. In this paper, I survey the early research on conservatism to...