ABSTRACT
The advantage of regarding all so-called capital expenditure, or expenditure upon fixed assets, as expenditure that will eventually have to be written off against revenue, apportioned equitably over a series of years, is that it provides a quite intelligible reason for disregarding fluctuations in realisable values at intermediate periods. It is a plan that can be easily understood by all persons of ordinary intelligence, and has, moreover, the merit of stating the requirements of the situation without the necessity of imposing confusing exceptions. So regarded, it becomes simple to reduce the whole business to a principle that will be readily intelligible to the general public and equally acceptable to specialists. It may be, and possibly will be, objected that our argument is for all practical purposes one for the universal double-account system in fact, if not in form.
