 In this video, I'm gonna go over a lot of the important questions you might have about the career of accounting. Things like what accounting is, what accountants do, their job satisfaction, salary, how to become one, their job outlook, and the best places to live if you go into this field. Now, if you appreciate this type of video and you want me to make more, go ahead and let me know that by gently tapping the like button and commenting down below. And if you haven't done it already, go ahead, hit that subscribe button and ring the notification bell so that you don't miss out on my future videos. So let's get right into it. First of all, let's talk about exactly what accountants do. Now, according to Google, this is the first definition that pops up right here, but that didn't make a whole lot of sense to me. I'll just have it pop up on the screen. So it's a lot of words. And to be fair, there are many different types of accountants, so it's really difficult to say exactly what accountants do in a few words. But basically, accountants are going to examine and prepare financial records. They're also going to make sure that taxes are paid legally, but properly and on time. And lastly, they are going to assess the financial operations of a company to make sure everything runs efficiently. And if you're not sure whether you want to become an accountant or not, check out my free six steps to finding your dream career guide below. It'll be linked in the description. Next, we're going to talk about some of the different work environments that you might be in if you became an accountant. So when most people think of accountants, they think that all they do is taxes because if you've interacted with an accountant, that's probably what they've done for you. But actually accountants work in many other different settings that may or may not have anything to do with taxes. So for instance, about 25% of accountants work in accounting, tax preparation, bookkeeping, and payroll services. 9% work in finance and insurance. 8% work for the government. 7% work for management of companies and enterprises. And 5% are self-employed. Most accountants of course work in offices, but over the last few years, many of them have been working from home. Most accountants also work in teams, but some of them work on their own as well. Next, we're going to be talking about job satisfaction. And this is an area that's very important if you're considering becoming an accountant. So according to careerexplorer.com, accounting is one of the least happy careers in the United States. It gets a score of 2.6 out of five stars, which is in the bottom 6% of careers. According to payscale.com, when it comes to meaning, accounting comes in a little bit low at about 38%. But when it comes to satisfaction, it's actually pretty good at about 71%. So you definitely are seeing some mixed results depending on the sources that you look at when it comes to becoming an accountant. So this is definitely one of those careers where you want to look into it, make sure you have a very good idea of what you're getting yourself into before you commit to it. But one of the positives of becoming an accountant is there's so many different directions that you can go because it's such a vast career. So if you become a certain type of accountant and you don't like your job, there are likely many different subspecialties that you can jump to relatively easily. And chances are you're gonna find one that you enjoy more. One thing that can significantly impact how happy you are is going to be the company that you work for. So for instance, accountants that worked for Google rated it at about 4.5 out of five stars. Whereas accountants that worked for this random place called EC or Tease and Co-LLP rated it at 3.1 out of five. So definitely check out glassdoor.com if you're thinking of working for a particular business and see how happy accountants that work at that business are. Next, we're gonna talk about how to become an accountant. Accountants typically have at least a bachelor's level degree and it's usually going to be in the major of accounting. Now one thing that's great about getting an accounting degree is you can work as an accountant or you can actually work in finance as well. Whereas if you got a finance degree, it's not necessarily as easy to work as an accountant. So accounting is a more flexible degree than finance since those two get compared quite a bit. There are also some colleges out there that offer specialized degrees such as forensics accounting or tax accounting. Now it is possible to become an accountant with just an associate level degree. Usually you'll get kind of an entry level job and you'll learn on the job and work your way up. But for the most part, most accountants do have at least a bachelor level degree. So numbers wise, 57% of accountants have bachelor's degrees, 23% have master's degrees and 3% have doctorates. So that's a total of 83% of accountants having at least a bachelor level degree. Most of them who have less than a bachelor's were likely grandfathered in and that option is no longer available. Next we're going to be talking about the pay in the United States. According to BLS, accountants and auditors make about $73,000 per year. If you can compare this to all financial related occupations, it's about on par to about $73,000. And if you can compare it to all occupations, it's $41,000, so it's much higher. Accountants that work in finance and insurance make around $78,000 a year on average. So that's one of the higher paying specialties. And the ones who work for the government make about $72,000, so it's a little bit lower. Most accountants do work full time and a lot of them work even more than full time at certain parts of the year. So of course, tax season is going to be a busy time of the year for people who do tax accounting for instance. And according to Glassdoor, accountants make about $70,000 a year so that does seem to match up pretty well. And business related occupations in general do make pretty good money, about $2.6 million over a lifetime, compared to the average of all majors and all occupations making about 2.4 million. And then business majors who go into business and financial related occupations make about 2.8 million over a lifetime. The highest paid occupations for business related majors in general are going to be technology or management related. So technology makes about 3 million over a lifetime and management makes around 3.3 million. So combining your accounting related skills with some really valuable technology related skills or leadership skills like Python, SQL, et cetera might be a good way to go. Next, we're going to be talking about the job outlook for accountants. And according to BLS, there are 1.3 million accounting jobs in the United States and it's growing at about 7% which is as fast as average. You can compare this to all other occupations which are growing at about 8% and financial related occupations which are growing below average at about 5%. Now, as economies become more and more globalized, aka countries are doing more and more business with each other, there's going to be a higher need for accountants that specialize in international trade. So there's expected to be really good demand in the future because there's going to need to be more and more accountants who are good at that. Many different countries trade and do business with the United States so accountants in the US especially are likely going to experience a lot more demand. Now, when it comes to the risk of automation, this is one that you hear about quite a bit when it comes to accountants. They have about a 50% risk according to willrobotstakemyjob.com and about 65% according to polling from accountants. And I do believe that there are some lower level jobs that are definitely going to be automated. However, jobs that require a lot of problem solving or they require you to be very familiar with tax law are not going to be automated very easily in my opinion. I talked about this extensively in the video where I talked about whether an accounting degree was worth it or not. So you can check that video out if you want to hear more about my opinion on whether it's going to be automated. Now I'm going to have some of the knowledge that you would need to know pop up on the screen right now. You can pause it if you want to see that. I'm going to have some of the skills you might need to know pop up on the screen. I'm also going to have some of the abilities you might need to know pop up on the screen, some of the personality characteristics that might be good for you. I'll have that pop up on the screen as well. And then I'm going to have some of the tasks that you might be doing on a day to day basis pop up on the screen, some of the technology related skills you might need to know, some of the tools that you might need to use, some of the work activities that you would regularly be doing, and some of the certifications that you might do, some of them are more general and then some of them are going to be specializations. And finally, let's talk about some of the best places to live in the United States if you are an accountant. When it comes to employment, the five best states to live are going to be California, New York, Texas, Florida, and Pennsylvania. And when it comes to how much you would get paid, five of the better states are going to be the District of Columbia, aka Washington DC, New York, New Jersey, California, and Massachusetts. And then when you add everything altogether, according to zippia.com, the five best are going to be Washington DC, New York, Connecticut, Delaware, and Rhode Island with Washington DC being number one. The five worst states to live as an accountant would be Wyoming, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and North Dakota with North Dakota being the worst. Check out my other videos right here. I made them just for you. Go ahead, gently tap that like button, hit that subscribe button, ring the notification bell, and comment down below any thoughts, comments, criticisms, et cetera, that you have on the video. And I will see you next time.