In manufacturing companies, labor and materials costs are broken into direct and indirect components. Direct costs are those that can be traced directly to the products that are being produced, while ...

FASB Accounting Standards Codification (ASC) Topic 842, Leases, issued in February 2016, marked a significant overhaul in the financial reporting of long-term leases. Its adoption created many ...

For small businesses, proper accounting techniques can easily mean the difference between a profitable, well-run company and a struggling business. If a company accurately accounts for its expenses ...

Claire Boyte-White is the lead writer for NapkinFinance.com, co-author of I Am Net Worthy, and an Investopedia contributor. Claire's expertise lies in corporate finance & accounting, mutual funds, ...

Cost accounting examines how a company spends money. All expenses are recorded and analyzed in detail and then reported to management, who uses this information to identify ways to increase efficiency ...

Federal regulations require that similar costs be treated consistently as either direct costs or indirect costs, in like circumstances. This regulation imposes a requirement on the University to ...

In a prior article, I wrote about the appeal of counting the Federal Government as a customer, because of the size of the government’s budget, as well as its creditworthiness. In that article, I ...

In the first article of this series of articles related to selling to the federal government, I discussed federal acquisition regulations (FAR), cost accounting standards (CAS) and the types of ...

Investopedia contributors come from a range of backgrounds, and over 25 years there have been thousands of expert writers and editors who have contributed. Suzanne is a content marketer, writer, and ...