Material harmony among Anglo group countries : a comparison of 1975 and 1994

"Recent occurences such as the 1993 agreement in which the International Organisation of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) allowed the International Accounting Standards Committee (IASC) to provide a single set of standards to be used in multinational securities offerings highlight the level of support for internationally harmonised accounting. Australia's own harmonisation program is one example of growing popularity of International Accounting Standards (IAS') among IASC member countries. However, standards that are too broad, and/or noncompliance with standards by individual companies may mean that the aims of international harmonisation are not being achieved. For this reason, this study examines accounting practices, rather than regulations, among four "Anglo" countries: Australia; Canada; the United Kindom; and the United States. The level of harmony of six individual accounting practices: Research and Development Expenditure; Inventory Cost Methods; Depreciation Methods; Disclosure of Extraordinary Items; and Associated Company Consolidation Methods; was measured as at 1975 and 1994 to determine whether harmonisation had occurred. The results indicated that harmonisation had occurred for only two of the practices, although fairly high levels of harmony existed for some of the remaining practices."--abstract.