- Nicholas Larson switched from pre-med to accounting for job security and employability.
- Accounting offers a path to upper-middle-class life with good pay and job security.
- Modernizing accounting culture and pay could improve its image and attract more talent.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Nicholas M. Larson, a 30-year-old certified public accountant and former IRS employee based in Fort Worth, Texas. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I'm a certified public accountant (CPA) with nearly a decade of experience in accounting, including my internships.
Some people say that "accounting isn't sexy" and that it's hard to get people to become accountants. My parents told me — and my accounting professors reinforced — that an accounting degree was one of the fastest and surest ways to a comfortable upper-middle-class life, and I believe that's true.
Changing from pre-med to accounting
I started college as a biochemistry major with plans to attend medical school but realized in my freshman year that going through the years of education and training required for a medical career wasn't what I wanted from life.
Accounting was the only other profession that "made sense;" it was logic-based and extremely employable, and job security coming out of college was important to me. Growing up, every accountant I knew had a pretty cushy lifestyle with great pay, flexible hours, and phenomenal job security.
My dad — who was a paramedic for most of his career — also has an accounting degree and an MBA, and my parents urged me to take an introductory course and see how things went. Accounting classes were actually fun because what I was doing finally made sense. I enjoyed the material and liked my classmates. Since I switched my major after my freshman year, I caught up on the credits I'd need to eventually get a CPA license by taking extra classes over the summer and winter breaks.
During my sophomore and junior years, I interned with a tax firm and a CPA firm doing bookkeeping and tax work. The internships were interesting and helpful. At bigger firms, interns might get assigned to scanning client documents and other repetitive tasks, but I worked at smaller firms and was able to see the majority of the tax process from start to finish.
Accounting provides a path to upper-middle-class life
After I graduated with a B.S. in accounting in 2017, I took a job with a local CPA firm in Oklahoma City. I met my wife in school and we got married after graduation. She worked as a school teacher in Oklahoma and after a year, we moved to Texas for better teacher pay, a bigger job market, and affordable housing.
I joined a national firm doing tax work in 2018. I got my CPA license the following year because the company paid for part of my testing fees. Getting a CPA license isn't mandatory for accountants — I know plenty of accountants without licenses who've had successful careers — but it's still considered the gold standard for accounting and I knew it'd help me move up in my career.
Later that year, I job-hopped to another local CPA firm and worked in a client-facing position doing tax and accounting work.
In 2021, I got a job with the federal government as an IRS agent. In May 2023, I left the IRS to join a different agency, where I still work, and the following month I launched my own CPA practice. My wife is a stay-at-home mom and handles all of my firm's communication during the day, while I do client work at night and on weekends.
Almost every time I job-hopped, I got around a 20% pay bump, a title increase, and a better work-life balance. I feel comfortable and happy with my life.
The culture needs to be modernized
One thing adding to the "accounting isn't sexy" perception is the fact that accountants' pay, benefits, and work-life balance haven't kept up with those of other professions.
The public accounting model has for so long been based on the idea of "up or out" — you either grind out the long hours until you get to the next level, burn out, get PIP'ed out, or get relegated to a junior role for the rest of your career.
Fixing the culture at some accounting firms and modernizing pay incentives would go a long way toward changing the profession's image.
Increasing base pay is great, but some firms are also doing really inventive stuff with compensation like profit sharing or becoming a corporation with stock shares and dividends rather than on a partnership like traditional firms.
Accounting will continue to be profitable
Accounting truly is the language of business and has limitless possibilities. There are so few degrees out there that give you the type of mobility that an accounting degree gives you.
Our world isn't going to be getting any less complex, and accounting prepares you to understand a lot of higher-level business concepts. I encourage people to just try it out.
Since starting my own firm, I haven't had to do a lot to get clients. Most clients come to me because their old CPA either died, retired, or is too busy to answer their calls and emails.
With the number of baby boomers set to retire in the next five years, I'm more confident than ever that accounting will continue to be a profitable career in which I can really add value to small businesses and impact our clients' lives.
If you're an accountant who loves your job and would like to share your story, email Jane Zhang at [email protected].