Accounting Conservatism, Aggregation, and Information Quality*: Accounting Conservatism, Aggregation, and Information Quality
Accounting Conservatism, Aggregation, and Information Quality*: Accounting Conservatism, Aggregation, and Information Quality
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DOI：
10.1111/j.1911-3846.2011.01069.x
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发表时间：
2012-03
影响因子：
3.6
通讯作者：
Qintao Fan;Xiao-Jun Zhang
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Qintao Fan;Xiao-Jun Zhang
研究了当企业可以通过代价高昂且不可收缩的行为来控制信息质量时的最优会计策略。研究表明，理想的会计具有两个特征：(i)会计报告汇总而不是直接报告基础信息；（二）会计核算存在保守性偏差。通过调用稳健性原则，考虑到事后的信息质量，这是对一个显然效率低下的会计方案的承诺，企业被诱导在事前控制信息质量方面花费更多的精力。因此，有偏差的会计制度提高了整体信息质量，提高了会计信息使用者的福利。在均衡状态下，信息使用者的福利随着企业控制信息质量的私人成本而降低，随着企业从有利的会计报告中获益而增加。
We study the optimal accounting policy when a firm can control the information quality through costly and noncontractible action. It is shown that the desirable accounting has two features:(i) the accounting report aggregates, rather than reporting directly, the underlying information;(ii) the accounting has a conservative bias. By invoking the conservatism principle, which serves as a commitment to an apparently inefficient accounting scheme given the ex post information quality, firms are induced to spend more effort in controlling information quality ex ante. As a result, a biased accounting system improves the overall information quality and enhances the welfare of accounting information users. In equilibrium the information users' welfare decreases with a firm's private cost of information quality control and increases with a firm's benefits from favorable accounting reports.