ABSTRACT
The term "Accountant" was used as applied to bookkeepers, long before there was a profession of accountancy at all. Many manufacturers are to-day keeping Cost Accounts who hardly knew that there were such things five years ago. There are as many different kinds of Cost Accounts as there are of manufacturing accounts. The matter is the more important -and the danger of damage done by incompetent so-called experts is all the more real-because there can be little doubt that, for some years to come at least, the installation of new costing systems is likely to provide the practitioner with a considerable amount of work. The mathematical mind but seldom answers to this description. The accounts of its costs department are primarily concerned with its dealings with its own staff. The counting-house accounts of a business are primarily concerned with its dealings with the outside world, and with its proprietors.
