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Tales from Towne: Calling All Accountants

Young Americans Center for Financial Education Young AmeriTowne Leave a Comment

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Accountants work hard in AmeriTowne all day!

Accountants work hard in AmeriTowne all day!

Who’s counting?

When you walk into a shop in Young AmeriTowne, it will be staffed with a manager, an accountant, and salespeople.  Each shop takes out a bank loan in order to pay their employees and pay for services that other shops provide.  By the end of the day, each shop must pay back this bank loan plus 10 % interest, regardless of whether or not the shop can afford to do so.  This makes the accountant’s role in each shop very important because they are responsible for their shop’s finances.

Young AmeriTowne’s seventeen shop economy requires seventeen sharp accountants. The accountant’s role is unique in that other students working in the same shop cannot fill in while they are on their breaks.  The accountant’s job is to pay the bills; over the course of the day they write approximately ten business checks to other shops before lunch.  For example, each shop must pay the radio station $16 for providing an on-the-air sound bite.  Once the business checks are written and tracked, the shop accounts should balance at $0.00.  Next, the account is responsible for depositing any income they’ve received – including business checks written to them or cash payments they’ve gotten for their goods, which will hopefully be enough to pay back the shop’s bank loan.  If the bank loan has been paid, whatever is leftover is considered the businesses’ profit.  The accountant can then opt to make a donation at the Donation Station, on behalf of the shop, if he or she chooses to do so.

Hard work required

Accountants focus on balancing a shop's books.

Accountants focus on balancing a shop’s books.

Not a position for the faint of heart, focus, determination, drive, perseverance, and old fashioned elbow grease are required for those seventeen select individuals. The accountants are the engines that drive each unique shop and keep a finger on the financial pulse.  It is also paramount for the student to be able to write legibly so that they can do their math correctly and other accountants can read incoming payments.   Accountants monitor the ebb and flow of cash and payments for each shop, so it is important to stress fiscal responsibility prior to coming to Young AmeriTowne.

Teachers tip

If you know that the time will be limited for the student’s day in Towne, you can have the accountants write a few of their expense checks before coming to see us.

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