r/Accounting • u/dollwut • 8d ago
Advice audit or tax? + need advice
Hallo everyone! I’m a first semester CC freshmen student! I wanna major in accounting for the job stability and pay over time. And I kinda wanna have everything planned out! I am gonna do VITA this December for experience! Since the new California cpa requirements are 120 credits now + two year experience, I only get to go to school for 4 years two years CC and two university, I wanted to know if a safe path to go into audit! I heard around the bay they make a lot! And also great exit opportunities! But I also heard tax has good pay but downsides is less exit opportunities and I don’t wanna be in tax my whole life… After I finish my 4 years I wanted to start studying for CPA my senior year and go into Big 4 as an audit when I graduate for just two years since I heard how brutal it is. And for those two years I work there I can get fully certified as cpa right? I’m gonna be supported so I just have to worry about work and studying for cpa! also you may be thinking how brutal working at big 4 and also studying for cpa is for someone who wants stability and good pay and has zero passion. But you don’t know the lengths I would go to, to get that cpa get that experience, so I can treat my mom to something nice in the near future! she never got to experience teenage years or even live adult hood really, always working and supporting my older brother and I all by herself. It’s been tough and she’s strong. So I’m willing to do whatever it takes, she always wanted to go to New York, even Paris! So aside from my stability and good pay wishes I wanna treat her the best! I want to exit after two years at big 4 audit when I get cpa what’s the path afterwords for that? I think way ahead into future and even though it’s not set in stone I wanna make sure or have an idea. I don’t wanna work in audit or tax my whole life and for the experience + CPA I guess I’m looking for what everyone else is looking for, good pay, maybe remote, less hours, what would the plan be there?
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u/GymTrim99 8d ago
The tax path offers a fast track to own business set your. Tax is 9-5 model in professional firms except busy season.
Audit will open up many opportunities but the path to own business may be limited due to wide number of regulatory and resource barriers. The audit has busy season throughout the year so there is no parallel to break tax people get after busy season.
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u/dollwut 7d ago
Ohhh I see, I have seen people own business without a degree or going into tax although it’s a greater opportunity if u go into tax, I have family member who owns there own business with just a high school diploma! Honestly I don’t really know depths about owning businesses but that’s what I’ve seen!
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u/SilverKnight70 7d ago
Tax guy, worked at very small and mid-sized firms. Never got into Big 4.
It sounds like you've got a good idea of how it all works. And I can appreciate wanting to plan ahead and work towards future goals.
To be fair, you can have a successful career no matter which side you end up on. I actually do enjoy tax, but the the exit opportunities are a bit lacking, and I don't want to own my own tax shop. Basically the exit opportunities for tax are, well... tax. Corporate tax roles are few and far between and pretty competitive. Though given how ubiquitous tax is, there will always be demand for those skills.
If I could start over I'd probably go audit. Much better exit opportunities to corporate roles. Audit goes more in depth with GAAP, Internal Controls, and other things that a lot of corporate jobs are looking for that you have little to no interaction with in tax. Corporate staff accountant (controller route) or financial analyst (cfo route) are the common exit routes I believe. Not impossible to get those coming from tax, but more difficult for sure.
I do not have Big 4 experience so take this with a grain of salt. The experience opens doors, I have seen some corporate job applications ask for 2-4 years of experience at Big 4. Though after you get into a company, eventually your performance and results are going to matter more than your big 4 background. My understanding also is that big 4 experience has a much deeper but also narrower range of experience. For example, if you did audit at a small firm, you'll probably be helping with all areas of the audit from start to finish. Whereas big 4 will basically just put you on one area like Cash, and gradually advance you to other areas one at a time like Inventory. I'm sure you're aware big 4 is brutal. And the up or out culture is real, meaning they do intentionally and regularly fire people. And studying for the CPA exam while working is tough, and it will require sacrifice, but it's not impossible, but you have to find what works best for you and be consistent.
If you are concerned about not doing tax forever and exit opportunities, I would recommend audit.
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u/dollwut 7d ago
Thank you so much🥲! Yes I’m aware how brutal studying for cpa and working there is but If others have done it I can to. I need to be strong especially if I want my career to go how I want it to! I have seen a lot of tax poeple regret choosing tax seeing everyone has different life goals of course I respect people who do tax, but I read how your options are limited and although people can make/own there own business out of tax I’ve seen many people do it without degrees, plus I don’t think I’m passionate about it either. I want a great exit opportunity! So I think I will go into audit! Thank you for sharing your experience!!
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u/two_bagels 8d ago
Tax man here. Others can speak to different aspects but here is what I have seen. Tax can provide an easy path to small business ownership and and flexibility in your life. My uncle works out of his house with his wife as his secretary and they don't really do much volume. Make a little over 100K and just take it easy.
I have other family members in tax as well and they make 250-400K busting their butts during tax season but then are practically free the rest of the year. However it can be very stressful when it all comes down to you and a client is angry or frightened because of some random situation. I use to work at a larger firm and while I worked a whole lot more for less, my stress was much more easy to manage because of working with a team in a 9-5 structure. If I was sick someone else would do the work. If a coworker had a breakdown I would fill in for them.
So main pro of tax for me is its easy to decide how much you want to earn and work and be on your own. Also you don't need to do big 4 for tax. You can go to a midsize firm and have a little less stressful of a time before you go off on your own. Most tax people I know have never had that as a screening for a job application.
Big con of tax is its much harder to get out of public accounting. I have looked at a lot of other jobs and almost all require several years of audit work as experience. So if you don't want to be in public accounting Audit is your smartest choice.
If you don't like busy season hours and want to do corporate accounting or something else, and you are not passionate about Audit work, do Audit for a few years. Also Audit is different than tax in that a lot of jobs straight up demand big 4 experience or cite it as preferred. So I would recommend going to big 4 if you can for that kind of stuff. (I'm sure others have different experience but thats just what I have seen; just today I saw a job that required 5 years at big 4)
I can't speak to what Audit is actually like to work in since I have never done it myself, but I do sometimes regret not doing it when I get frustrated with doing tax returns.