Opinion: A Stimulus Plan And Some Satire

By J. Edward Ketz, associate professor of accounting at Penn State's Smeal College of Business.

To stimulate the economy, one needs to stimulate the accounting. Bankers have often broadcast this mantra in an effort to end fair-value accounting, but these bankers are thinking too small. Let's really stimulate the economy by really stimulating the accounting. And it won't cost taxpayers one cent!

My proposal is very simple. As the economy lists in its doldrums, why not goose the accounting reports and get investors buying stocks again? Once stock prices rise gloriously and the Dow again sees 10,000, the economy will be fixed.

We can achieve this felicitous state by granting each company in the United States the ability to inject $5 billion into its own earnings. As the banks (e.g., Citigroup (C Quote), Wells Fargo (WFC Quote), and U.S. Bancorp(USB Quote)) and auto manufacturers (e.g., General Motors (GM Quote)and Ford (F Quote)) remain in serious trouble, we can empower them to add $50 billion into their earnings statements.

We shall extend business enterprises the freedom to boost income in whatever quarters they wish over, say, the next five years. That would allow corporate executives much needed flexibility to manage their earnings. And we don't have to worry about transparency because Americans only want its promise, not its fulfillment.

Congress should permit these companies the freedom to show this infusion of earnings wherever they wish. After all, in a capitalistic society as ours, managers are the ones who best know how to massage the income statements for maximal benefit. Besides, the geography of the financial statements is unimportant to investors and creditors.