On Jul. 22, the NASBA and the AICPA issued the ninth edition of the Uniform Accountancy Act (UAA), which offers guidelines for state legislatures to create their own CPA requirements, according to CFO.com.

It is to be noted that the latest UAA version contains a pathway that merely requires a bachelor’s degree in accounting—the equivalent of 120 credit hours—plus two years of experience and passing the CPA exam, which in line with the steps various states have already taken.

The updated UAA also allows CPAs to work across state lines with one license, said the NASBA and the AICPA.

“What this essentially does is make it easier for states to change their licensing rules and have them accepted by other states,” said Jack Castonguay, a Hofstra University associate professor of accounting. “That’s highly relevant right now, given so many states are going from requiring 150 hours to be licensed to options that include 120 hours.”

AICPA/NASBA characterized the move as a way to ease the sectors ongoing talent shortage and make way for increased mobility for existing CPAs.

“We believe that these revisions remove barriers to licensure, while at the same time will strengthen the profession by maintaining a strong pipeline of accounting talent and maintaining the system of cross-border practice currently enjoyed by CPAs,” AIPCA’s UAA Committee Chair Thomas Neil and NASBA’s UAA Committee Chair CPA Dan Vuckovich said in in an introductory letter to the new standards.

According to CFO-com It is important to note that the UAA updated pathways and across the different states does not take away the 150-hour pathway as a licensure option. The only exception is Minnesota, which has plans to sunset the 150-hour pathway, according to the Minnesota Society of CPAs.

While the organizations resisted the changes at first, they have been considering lowering credit-hour requirements for CPAs for a while now. In October, they issued a draft of the UAA that had the 120-hour pathway.

“While past joint efforts at promoting high professional standards, protecting the public, and increasing uniformity of regulation have been important, they had not produced the level of results either organization felt were satisfactory,” the AICPA/NASBA wrote in the preface to the UAA’s ninth edition. “Coupled with other significant factors occurring in the global marketplace for accounting services, this led both AICPA and NASBA to begin to examine new ways to respond in this area.”

The latest edition of the UAA would still need to be accepted by all 55 licensing jurisdictions in U.S., which covers all 50 states, Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C. However, Hofstra’s Castonguay is mostly certain all will eventually adopt the new guidelines in some fashion.

“If they don’t, they’d be putting themselves at a competitive disadvantage,” he explained. “I don’t see any reason why all the jurisdictions won’t ultimately adopt this.”

Additionally, Castonguay thinks the changes will increase the number of accounting students and professionals in the years ahead.