The AICPA has released its 2021 Trends report, covering accounting education, the CPA exam and public accounting firms’ hiring of recent graduates. Among its findings is that “in 2020, diverse hiring of new bachelor’s and master’s of accounting graduates into accounting/finance functions of U.S. CPA firms increased by almost five percentage points (includes multiethnic hires).”  

Specifically, the report found the number of Asian or Pacific Islander new graduate new hires increased by 1.9 percentage points, the number of Black new graduate new hires increased by 0.6 percentage points, and the number of Hispanic or Latino new graduate new hires increased by 1.6 percentage points. “These three groups comprise their highest (or very near their highest) percentage of the whole of new graduate new hires in the history of Trends’ data collection,” the report said. 

The document also noted a decreasing number of accounting graduates across the country during the 2019-2020 academic year. It reported decreases of 2.8 percent and 8.4 percent at the bachelor’s and master’s levels, respectively. On the other hand, it found that accounting programs were “optimistic about enrollments for the 2021–2022 academic year,” reporting that 58 percent of both bachelor’s and master’s programs respondents said that they expected enrollment for that academic year to be the same or higher than the 2020–2021 academic year. 

With regard to hiring and hiring expectations, the report said that total hiring of new accounting graduates in 2020 has decreased by 10 percent. Yet there was a 2 percent increase in hiring of master’s graduate new hires. “New non-accounting graduates hired into accounting and finance functions have increased by 10 percentage points,” the report said. “The hiring mix continues to shift, with 57.3% of new graduate new hires being accounting graduates and 42.7% being non-accounting graduates.  

Yet the report says that most firms expect that their hiring levels will remain the same or increase: “Of firms that hired one or more accounting graduates in 2020, 74% expect to hire the same number or more in 2022 as compared with 2021. Eighty-nine percent of all U.S. CPA firms expect to have the same number or more CPAs on staff in 2022 in comparison with 2021.” 

Also, according to the report, “New accounting graduate new hires are increasingly being assigned to audit—a shift of 11.5 percentage points from 2018.”

Another of the report’s key insights related to the CPA exam. Not surprisingly, the number of new CPA exam candidates decreased  in 2020 because of short-term closings and restrictions at  test centers, and these COVID-19 concerns continued into 2021l. “As such, while new CPA Examination candidates decreased less than 0.5% between 2018 and 2019, there was a 17% decrease between 2019 and 2020,” said the report. A 6% increase occurred between 2020 and 2021.” 

The AICPA specifically addressed difficulties within the CPA pipeline and proposed solutions. The report states: “The AICPA acknowledges that there are challenges in the CPA pipeline that the pandemic accelerated. As a result, we are accelerating our efforts to reverse these trends evidenced in this report. … Numerous teams within the AICPA are all aligned in attracting high school and college students to the accounting profession and the CPA, providing education and support services to high school and college teachers, and collaborating with the many constituents engaged with the CPA Candidates as they journey through the CPA pipeline to licensure.”

The AICPA said that the profession collectively need to promote K-12 and high school students interest in accounting; university students majoring in accounting and other related majors; university students deciding to sit for the CPA exam; CPA candidates securing the CPA license; young professionals further exploring sitting for the CPA exam; and the promotion of the accounting profession and the CPA license globally.” 

The report includes several pages of charts providing details about the supply of accounting graduates, the demand for public accounting recruits and CPA exam results.