Keywords: accounting information distortion causes and countermeasures

Accounting information refers to the economic information that reflects the value movement of accounting subject through accounting practice by using accounting theory and methods in the process of economic activities. With the development of productive forces and social progress, people's dependence on information is getting stronger and stronger, and the quality of accounting information is paid more and more attention in China. The distortion of accounting information not only affects the formulation of national macroeconomic decision-making, weakens the macro-control ability, but also may lead to micro-decision-making mistakes or delay the fighter plane, resulting in irreparable losses. Therefore, it is urgent to eradicate the distortion of accounting information. This paper intends to discuss the causes of accounting information distortion and how to prevent it.

First, the performance of accounting information distortion

The distortion of accounting information can be understood from three aspects: First, the distortion of economic business distorts accounting information. Some public institutions, in order to achieve a certain purpose, falsely report profits and losses by means of falsifying income, arbitrarily listing costs and expenses, and not keeping accounts in time for expenditures and property losses. Second, the distortion of accounting information distorts accounting information. Some business leaders and accountants, for personal purposes, treat guests and give gifts, pay bribes, squander money and other illegal expenses, and include them in legal expenditure items by means of IOUs, forged invoices and receipts. The third is the distortion of accounting information caused by the imperfect financial accounting system. The book value of some enterprises' assets is not priced according to the relevant system, which leads to the lack of flexibility in asset pricing and cannot truly reflect the number of assets owned by enterprises.

Second, the harm of accounting information distortion

1. The distortion of enterprise accounting information increases the "bubble" elements and uncertainties in the operation of the national economy, which cannot truly reflect the actual situation in the operation of the national economy, making it impossible for the country to correctly judge the current economic situation, leading to various economic policies that may deviate from the correct track of economic operation and lead to decision-making mistakes.

2. The distortion of accounting information masks the real financial situation of enterprises, which not only causes a large loss of national tax revenue, but also causes many non-performing loans, which is not conducive to preventing financial risks.

3. The distortion of accounting information first aggravates the unfair distribution, further inclines the distribution to individuals, reduces the accumulation of enterprises and weakens the development potential. The second is to give some lawless elements an opportunity to engage in corruption and bribery and squander public funds in order to achieve the purpose of economic crimes.

4. The distortion of accounting information can't correctly reflect the financial situation and operating results of enterprises, which is not conducive to self-evaluation and decision-making of enterprises, and may make enterprises bankrupt and laid off workers, resulting in social instability.

Third, the causes of accounting information distortion

1. In accounting work, it is very serious that the law is not obeyed and the law is not investigated. Although China has made some achievements in the construction of accounting laws and regulations system, due to the current phenomenon of non-compliance with laws and lax enforcement, many problems are only reconciliation or minor fines, or even nothing, which seriously affects the seriousness and authority of accounting law and leads to many adverse consequences. On the one hand, it directly condones the agent to tamper with accounting information. Because of lax law enforcement, the risks that agents take in cheating are relatively small compared with the benefits they get from it, so they are objectively condoned to cheat in desperation. On the other hand, because the law fails to punish some ugly phenomena in society, money worship and hedonism have become the fashion of some people, thus affecting people's outlook on life, values and sense of social responsibility, especially when it affects entrusted agents, accounting information will be difficult to achieve its due authenticity.

2. The accounting standard system is not perfect. Accounting standards stipulate the basic requirements for accounting recognition, measurement and external provision of financial statements, but due to the wide applicability of the standards and some established principles of the standards themselves, accounting information will be untrue. With the diversification of enterprise management mode, the expansion of business scope and the increasingly complex social, legal and financial environment, the personality of similar accounting matters is increasingly rich, and statutory accounting policies tend to provide enterprises with broader accounting standards. For the same economic matter, there are often different accounting treatment methods to choose from, which also brings difficulties to accounting "truthfully reflect". Enterprises adopt different valuation methods for inventory, which will have different effects on their financial status and operating results. In which way can it be truly reflected? The meaning of "truth" should be "in line with objective facts" and should be unique. It cannot be said that there are many different aspects of the same thing that are true reflections. In addition, there is still a certain time lag between accounting standards and accounting practice, and the provisions of accounting standards often lag behind the development of accounting practice and the innovation of economic behavior. When new situations, new fields and new industries appear, it is difficult to find long-term effective accounting standards as the basis of accounting operation, so the phenomenon of "no basis" in enterprise accounting treatment often appears in practice.

3. The quality of accountants is uneven. Accounting information is generated when accountants confirm and measure accounting elements, so it is inevitable to estimate, judge and reason some uncertain factors in objective economic activities. The estimation, judgment and reasoning of accountants with different qualities often lead to different results. Even if some accountants with poor quality follow the accounting standards, due to the limitation of their understanding level, it is inevitable that the measurement accounting data will be out of touch with the actual situation and the accounting information will be untrue. In addition, some enterprises are still using the management mode under the planned system, and there is cronyism, which makes the poor quality unable to go down and the high quality unable to go up. Enterprises do not pay enough attention to the improvement of accountants' professional quality, which leads to their low quality and skills, and are prone to operational and principled errors, such as arbitrarily changing the corresponding relationship of subjects, misusing accounting subjects, confusing accounting confirmation and measurement, etc. At the same time, the lack of professional ethics of accountants, the lack of professional judgment ability of accountants and the weak legal awareness of accountants also affect the accuracy of accounting information.

4. The supervision mechanism is not perfect. At present, China's accounting information quality supervision is divided into internal supervision and external supervision. Internal supervision refers to the accounting supervision of enterprise units. Some enterprises have not established the necessary internal accounting supervision and control system, and some internal accounting supervision and control systems are not perfect or can not play a role. External accounting supervision includes government accounting supervision and social audit supervision. In the accounting supervision of government departments, the supervision subjects of government departments are diversified and their responsibilities are unclear; The phenomenon of lax supervision and law enforcement by government departments is more serious; The low professional ethics of some law enforcement personnel has affected the law enforcement image of government departments. In the aspect of social audit supervision, the quality of employees is not high, and their professional level obviously cannot meet the needs of market development; Some intermediaries and their employees have low professional ethics, lack of quality awareness, responsibility awareness and risk awareness, and their practice quality is poor.

5. The person in charge of the unit illegally interferes with the accounting work. In order to seek personal gain, small group interests or whitewash leadership achievements, the responsible persons of some units, on the one hand, instigate or force accounting personnel to handle false business, tamper with accounting data and fill in false accounting statements, which directly leads to the distortion of accounting information. On the other hand, because the provisions of accounting laws and regulations in the past were not clear about the subject of accounting responsibility, the subject of accounting responsibility was diversified, with the person in charge of the unit, accounting personnel and other personnel as the subject of accounting responsibility, resulting in the phenomenon of multiple subjects and no one being responsible.

6. Some problems caused by computer bookkeeping. It is a progress and trend to introduce computers into accounting work. However, due to the low computer literacy of accountants, the existing software is generally flawed in security, and there are often many loopholes in the internal control of computer-using units, which affect the importance and authenticity of accounting information. This problem may be more harmful because of its invisibility.

Fourthly, the countermeasures to control the distortion of accounting information.

1. Strengthen the concept of legal system and fully implement the accounting law. "Accounting Law" is the fundamental law and the criterion of accounting work. The new Accounting Law further emphasizes the authenticity and integrity of accounting, clarifies that the person in charge of the unit is the responsible subject of accounting work, and increases the punishment for the person in charge of the unit, which provides a guarantee for comprehensively improving the quality of accounting information. Therefore, it is of great significance to strengthen the publicity and study of the new Accounting Law, improve the knowledge and understanding of the new laws and regulations, and enhance their legal concept to solve the problem of accounting information distortion.

2. Comprehensively improve the accounting standards system. When formulating accounting regulations and accounting standards, we should try our best to overcome or reduce our own uncertainty and make necessary provisions on accounting uncertainty. First of all, the final accounting standards should have a more scientific and advanced analysis and prediction of the changes in the future accounting environment, so as to make the development of accounting more stable and sustainable, and avoid the uncertainty of the future environment from having a great impact on accounting. Secondly, some definitions and definitions in the Code should be accurately analyzed and explained. If a definition and interpretation may have multiple understandings, all possible understandings should be elaborated and the application of various understandings should be explained in detail to avoid misunderstanding to standard users. In line with the development of economy and science and technology, we should study new things and phenomena in economic life such as derivative financial instruments, goodwill and human resources as soon as possible, and formulate standards and methods for confirmation to ensure the quality of information.

3. Strengthen the construction of accounting team and comprehensively improve the quality of accounting personnel. Perfecting accounting qualification management system and follow-up education and training system is the guarantee to eradicate accounting information distortion. First of all, we should fully implement the accounting personnel qualification management system, focusing on the implementation of the accounting personnel qualification certificate system. Secondly, improve the continuing education and training system for accountants, including the professional ethics education, accounting theory and practice education. Accounting professional ethics education should be placed in the first place in the continuing education of accounting personnel. When performing their duties, accountants are law-abiding, honest, familiar with accounting procedures, proficient in accounting laws and regulations, and provide real and useful accounting information to users of accounting information in a timely manner.

4. Improve the social supervision system and strictly enforce the law. Improve and perfect the internal control system of enterprises, strengthen the basic accounting work, and improve the self-discipline and supervision ability of enterprises. Law enforcement departments such as finance, taxation and auditing should give full play to their functions; The problems found in violation of discipline shall be dealt with in a timely manner in accordance with the relevant provisions of the Accounting Law. Improve the social supervision system, vigorously develop the audit of certified public accountants, and comprehensively implement the audit visa system for corporate financial and accounting statements. The unaudited accounting statements have no legal effect, so as to give full play to the functions of social intermediary institutions. At the same time, specific punishment measures should be formulated for CPA's accounting information audit visa, and those who practice fraud and violate financial discipline should be dealt with severely. If the circumstances are serious, economic penalties and administrative sanctions shall be imposed until criminal responsibility is investigated.

5. Implement the accountant appointment system to enhance the objectivity and independence of accounting work. Through the implementation of the appointment system, it can be ensured that accountants can work relatively independently and are not completely subject to the person in charge of the enterprise, thus avoiding the dilemma of "being able to stand, being able to stand". Judging from the current situation, this measure has really played a role in ensuring the quality of enterprise accounting information. At the same time, strengthening the legal responsibility of unit leaders in accounting work and making clear that unit leaders are responsible for the authenticity and integrity of their accounting work and accounting materials are the key to eradicate the distortion of accounting information.

6. Formulate accounting standards and auditing standards related to accounting computerization as soon as possible. With the popularization of computerized accounting, computers and accounting work have become more and more inseparable. At present, there are no accounting standards and auditing standards in China, which are not in line with international practice and lag behind the actual work requirements, which will inevitably affect the quality of accounting work under the new situation. Therefore, we should formulate corresponding standards as soon as possible to standardize the accounting work under the condition of computerized accounting to ensure the quality of accounting information.