Shortage of accountants and auditors leads to new initiative at the state level

MUSCATINE, Iowa (KWQC) - The Iowa State Auditors Office is creating jobs for those who have an associate’s degree with a new initiative to counter the decreasing amount of accountants and auditors entering the field.

According to Bureau of Labor statistics, the field has seen a 17% decrease since 2019 meaning there are more accounting jobs available than are being filled.

Iowa State Auditor Rob Sand was at Muscatine Community College on Tuesday to discuss how the new initiative gives those with associates degrees an opportunity to work for the State Auditor.

“We really want Iowans to know that if they’re interested in a two year degree that we’re going to recognize the value in that by hiring people with a two year degree,” Sand said. “There’s a lot of people with plenty of common sense who are value based thinkers who might go get a two year degree. And right now nationwide, there is a shortage of accountants and auditors out there. So we want to expand the number of people that we are considering for employment in our office.”

Accountants and auditors are considered the taxpayers watchdogs which makes them an incredibly important cog in the machine.

“The bottom line is this is the integrity business, and it’s the accountability business, you want to make sure that taxpayers assets and their money is being handled in a really responsible way,” Sand said. “If you want that you need to have people who are handling that money who know that someone’s gonna be looking at it on the back end, doing an audit on the back end, and that helps them avoid the temptation to misuse that money.”

Students at Eastern Iowa Community Colleges are a beneficiary of the new initiative as many are getting ready to graduate and enter the workforce here in December.

“To partner with the state, and for them to recognize that we do produce the graduates that are necessary for the workforce,” Dr. Sonya Williams, the Chancellor for EICC said. “We show today that we do have the students who are interested, we will graduate students this December who are ready to go into the workforce. So this was very timely to hear that the state is welcoming students with associate degrees in Applied Science.”

Dr. Williams went on to say that in Muscatine, accounting and auditor jobs pay roughly $55,000 annually and in the Quad Cities, that number raises to $68,000.

If you’re interested in pursuing a degree in accounting or another field at Eastern Iowa Community Colleges, visit EICC.edu for more information.

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