Accountant / CPA shortage

There has been many articles and talk about shortage of accountants and CPA. As a CPA, I wanted to give my 2 cents.

LINK

This article here sums it up pretty well. Honestly, this profession just isn't a great return on investment. To be a CPA, you need 150 college credits (120 for BBA + 30 through masters or double major), plus you need to study and pass the grueling and difficult CPA exam. This exam isn't a joke, it took me 2 times to pass FAR and REG. The 30 additional hours over your BBA is costly and pointless, especially given how expensive college has gotten. You are talking about adding an additional $10,000 cost (if you are doing masters or MBA you are adding $30K more). The Becker CPA review prep and scheduling to take the exam is also expensive ($2,300 + $800 = $3,100). So you are spending minimum $13,100 on top of the time and stress studying for these exams.

I worked at 2 of the Big 4 firms and the hours are really bad and if are studying for the CPA exam while working, it is a nightmare. The worst thing is that the salary is just not worth all of this trouble. Kids coming out of school who starts with IT Advisory doing IT audit, data analytics, cloud assessments, and cybersecurity consulting are paid often times more than CPAs. Why? Advisory pays more than Assurance (by default) and IT Advisory pays way more than Assurance since they can bill the client higher for IT projects. Basically, Audit projects don't make too much money for the firm as much as IT consulting projects. You work less hours and get paid more in the IT advisory side. Many people (including myself) switched Big 4 and got into the IT Advisory practice. Years later, I am going cyber GRC cloud assessments and make pretty good money. I make more than many of my peers who stayed in the accounting field. Those peers work continue to work crazy hours and gets paid poorly if you consider the $/hour rate.

Obviously there is going to be a CPA shortage. To get the certificate, you have to go through tons of hoops and the return isn't that great.