Abstract: Cost is the product of commodity economy, an economic category in commodity economy and the main component of commodity value. The content of cost is often subordinate to the needs of management. In addition, because the content of economic activities is different, the meaning of cost is also different. With the development of social economy and the improvement of enterprise management requirements, the concept and connotation of cost are constantly developing and changing, and the range of cost that people can feel is gradually expanding. The theoretical structure of cost accounting is an organic whole composed of the objectives, assumptions, objects and principles of cost accounting. Strengthening the research on it not only has important theoretical value, but also has practical guiding significance.
[Keywords:] cost; Target; principle
This paper discusses the theoretical structure of cost accounting. The industrial revolution led to the emergence of cost accounting, and its theory and method were gradually formed and developed with the improvement of social productivity and the objective needs of economic management. As a relatively independent branch of accounting, cost accounting needs a theoretical structure to establish a unified logical reasoning system. The theoretical structure of cost accounting is an organic whole consisting of a series of interrelated goals, objects and principles based on cost accounting, and its purpose is to explain, evaluate, guide and improve the practice of cost accounting.
First, the goal of cost accounting
1. Basic goal. It is to make a certain cost bring as much income or income as possible, that is, to improve economic efficiency. Cost accounting begins with the measurement, recording, calculation and supervision of costs and expenses, and serves to improve economic benefits, with economic benefits as the highest goal.
2. Specific objectives. It refers to who to provide information to, what information to provide and how to provide information in cost accounting practice. Cost accounting mainly provides specific and comprehensive cost accounting information for relevant internal departments and employees in the form of cost reports, statistical data and special reports, so as to facilitate their cost planning and management control.
3. The ultimate goal. It is an effective allocation of scarce resources to maximize cost-effectiveness. The most important feature of cost accounting is to pay attention to the detailed planning and effective control of enterprise resources. How to arrange and use the above resources, enterprises must plan the input and use of resources according to the tasks of enterprise production and operation, and measure the efficiency and benefit of these resources after they are put into use.
Second, the cost accounting assumptions
1. Cost Accounting Entity. According to the viewpoint of modern cost accounting, independent economic entities such as enterprises or other organizations are the real subjects of cost expenditure, and their costs refer to all kinds of material materials, services and wages paid to employees. These are all consumed or abandoned in order to achieve the ultimate goal, or the price paid for income.
2. going concern. It means that cost accounting should be based on continuous normal economic activities. In this way, the principles, procedures and methods of cost accounting can be established on the basis of non-liquidation, which means that all assets are priced according to the going concern value, the consumption of assets is priced according to the actual cost, and all expenses and costs reflect the monetary value of the consumed assets, thus maintaining the consistency and stability of cost accounting information processing.
3. Cost calculation by stages. Going concern determines the current and future expected state. In order to provide cost accounting information in a certain period consistent with the accounting statement period, the use of accounting stage makes cost accounting have distinct characteristics in the measurement method and content of cost and expenses, and correctly divides the boundaries of cost and expenses in each period. This can be beneficial to the confirmation and measurement of expenses, income and profits, ensure the authenticity of cost accounting information and avoid misleading users.
4. Multiple measurements. Cost is generally manifested as the price paid by economic activities, including the consumption of material materials, human resources, physical strength and mental power. The advantage of monetary measurement lies in its extensive comprehensiveness and generalization ability. However, due to the limitation of people's understanding level, it is difficult to completely convert the non-monetary measurement attributes such as mental cost of human resources into monetary measurement or its accuracy cannot be guaranteed. Therefore, the measurement of cost accounting can be combined with monetary measurement and non-monetary measurement, which not only reflects the costs and benefits of various economic businesses in monetary units, but also uses physical indicators and even words to explain the contributions and losses made by employees.
5. Fair distribution. The fairness of cost allocation is directly related to the reliability of cost accounting information. The so-called fairness refers to the selection of indirect cost allocation standards, which should be based on causality and choose the standard closest to the cost allocation level. It is required to minimize the influence of subjective factors and maintain the rationality of the distribution method. Fairness is a relative concept, which is not only a subjective assumption, but also a basic premise of cost accounting information.
Third, the cost accounting object
Cost accounting is a branch of accounting that takes expenses as the object, classifies, measures and allocates expenses in the process of capital movement, and provides objective basis for cost prediction, decision-making, control, analysis and assessment. In essence, the cost accounting object, like the general accounting object, still lies in the capital movement in the process of social reproduction, but the difference is limited to the capital movement of capital consumption, with the characteristics of focusing on the capital movement of the whole unit and more on the capital movement of the responsible unit within the unit. In essence, cost accounting is the control accounting for rational use of internal resources, which mainly serves the internal cost management of enterprises and provides information needed for decision-making and performance evaluation.
Fourth, the principle of cost accounting
The principle of cost accounting is a guide to standardize the behavior of cost accounting, a basic principle that cost accounting should follow, and provides high-quality cost information needed by information users. While adhering to the general accounting principles, cost accounting should meet its unique requirements and expand or change the connotation of some principles.
1. means that cost accounting must abide by the provisions of relevant laws, regulations and systems, and strictly abide by the scope of cost expenditure to ensure the accuracy and reliability of information. At the same time, we should not artificially confuse the boundaries between cost and period cost, different cost calculation objects and different period costs. Strictly speaking, these are also illegal acts.
2. The beneficial principle. The allocation method of cost should be selected according to the principle of cost drive and benefit, which embodies the idea of "whoever benefits will bear" When choosing the distribution method, according to the requirements of the benefit principle, the method adopted is directly proportional to the cost allocated by each distribution object, with more negative and less negative, thus reflecting the fairness and rationality of the distribution cost.
3. Goal principle. Enterprises must have a clear goal in cost management, and the expected cost expenditure can bring as many benefits as possible, that is, maximize the cost benefit. This requires that the information provided by cost accounting should be targeted, provide the required information resources for cost management in time, and meet the needs of decision-making.
4. The principle of comprehensibility. Because the main purpose of cost accounting is to provide users with cost information that is helpful to their decision-making, understandability is an important quality characteristic. The so-called understandability refers to ensuring that all important matters can be fully disclosed and avoiding providing too trivial information to make users irrelevant. From the perspective of information providers, under the premise of ensuring relevance and reliability, efforts should be made to make cost accounting information easy to understand and facilitate users to analyze and use understandable information resources.
Verb (abbreviation of verb) conclusion
The goal of cost accounting belongs to the highest level of the theoretical structure of cost accounting and constitutes its theoretical cornerstone; Cost accounting hypothesis stipulates the premise and constraint conditions of cost accounting operation; The confirmation and measurement of cost accounting objects and elements reflect the specific requirements of cost accounting objectives; As the basic guiding principle of cost accounting and the concrete specification of actual treatment, cost accounting principle is a powerful means to ensure the realization of cost accounting objectives.
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