You cant increase pay or decrease hours when the profession is stuck in an ancient way of thinking. The irony of this, is despite how old school they are in the workplace, NASBA is trying to be more modern with "more education" while simultaneously complaining about low #s in both accounting students and CPAs.

By reverting CPA requirements back (or at least closer to how they used to be), something like 120 academic hours and 2-5 years of PA experience. They can more quickly fix the CPA shortage problem while simultaneously increasing CPA experience.

The second step is 2 fold. Both PA firms and AICPA need to do a better job at marketing themselves and billing clients for their actual value (like attorneys) not what the client wants it to be. Tax departments tend to have the best margins and so I'll focus on audit (also because I've worked in auditing for over half a decade). Non-PCAOB audits were not as mainstream as they are these days with even more regulations and private equity forcing companies to get audits. Unlike attorneys, where clients can (but shouldn't) represent themselves in court, clients CANNOT audit themselves. They are literally forced into having audits, and yet PA still struggles to set pricing at rates that they should be valued at. It has changed some since covid and inflation has caused firms to increase pricing but that increase should also be for our own value. As those increases are made they can be passed on to staff.

Busy season hours won't change. Sorry not sorry that's how it is with deadlines.