Today we are going to discuss a service that the big 4 is offering that is in the news. That service is tax reform advice. I wanted to speak about this because tax reform is in the news because of Donald trump. It is one of his biggest promises to create jobs. It will definitely create jobs at PwC, KPMG, Deloitte and EY.
I also wanted to speak about it to give some insight into how the big 4 create ideas and win work.
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What are tKPMG, PwC, Deloitte and Ernst & Young doing around tax reform?
They are meeting with clients and making sure that they are thinking about tax reform and planning appropriately for it. In order to do this, they reach out to clients and set up huge meetings. In order to prep for these meetings, the big 4 put together huge slide decks and have a number of specialists come to the meeting. This means that it’s not only the client contact that goes to the meeting. There are in fact many people that go to these meetings because there are millions of dollars at stake. The largest companies have a lot to lose if they don’t plan for tax reform correctly. It is also typical for the largest companies to have all of the big 4 come in and propose for this work. In some cases it might not be a proposals. It might just be updates. This is especially true with tax reform because many people believe that it might not even be passing soon.
What services are the big 4 offering related to Tax Reform
What services are they offering. Many of the big 4 are offering accounting method changes because of the timing differences.
When something like this or fatca or big data comes out the big 4 all take positions on the issue and designate people as specialists in the field. Then they march those people out to all of their clients. They do that because projects like tax reform could be millions of dollars because they are significant changes to existing regimes. For example, PwC has former chairman of the ways and means committee, david camp, who drafted tax reform back in 2014. Many people think that tax reform might have many of the features that he drafted in his bill, so PwC appears to have an edge in the specialist area.
Another example would be Brexit. The big 4 are simultaneously speaking to clients about Brexit. Why do I mention this. I mention this so that you guys can think about which line of service that you want to go to when you joing the big 4. If you think tax reform will actually pass in the next couple of years, then the tax line of service would be a good group to join. Back in 1986, when the initial tax reform was passed, many people made partner very quick because there was so much work. Many people think the same thing will happen here. Many people are betting their careers on it.
On the other side, the big 4 used to sell tax reform services back in 2014 when David camp had his proposal and nothing came of that. The clients that paid a lot of money modeling back then might be hesitant modeling for tax reform now.
In conclusion, tax reform and Brexit are huge regulatory changes. When you are assessing which line of service or group to go to when recruiting with the big 4, you might want to go to the group that is impacted by the most recent regulatory changes. Just think of Sarbanes Oxley in the early 2000s and what that did to the auditing industry.