Accountant
Key facts
Accountants review and analyse financial statements, budgets, financial reports, and business plans in order to check for irregularities resulting from error or fraud, and provide their clients with financial advice in matters such as financial forecasting and risk analysis. They may audit financial data, resolve insolvency cases, prepare tax returns and provide other tax-related advice in reference to current legislation.
Accountants are financial experts who meticulously examine financial records and provide strategic advice. Your work involves scrutinizing financial statements, budgets, and business plans to identify errors or potential fraud. You'll also leverage your expertise to offer guidance on financial forecasting, risk analysis, and tax compliance, ensuring businesses operate efficiently and within legal frameworks.
- • Reviewing and analyzing financial statements, budgets, and reports.
- • Identifying and resolving discrepancies or irregularities in financial data.
- • Preparing tax returns and providing tax-related advice based on current legislation.
Where this occupation is in demand
Reported labour shortages and surpluses, by year. Published for occupation groups, not for individual job titles.
Figures cover Business and administration professionals — 134 jobs including this one.
In shortage: Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Germany and 8 more.
Longest-running shortage: Belgium, 3 years.
Where it is regulated, your qualification would need formal recognition before you could practise.
Select a place on the map to see its figures.
About this source›
Source: ELA/EURES labour shortages and surpluses. Readings are published at occupation-group level, and cover Europe. Editions differ in annex layout and country coverage, so a change between years does not always mean the labour market changed. Countries in grey were not reported, which is not the same as being in balance.
What these words mean
The four things this section reports
- Reported demand
- Whether employers report needing people in this job — a judgement published by a national or EU body, not a count.
- Where it is heading
- Which way employment in this job is expected to move over the coming years, from an official projection.
- Openings
- Roughly how many openings arise — from growth and from people leaving the job.
- Typical pay
- What people in this job typically earn where the source publishes it. Blank does not mean unpaid; it means nobody publishes it for that place.
A measure is left out when nobody publishes it for that place, rather than shown as zero.
Which way the market leans for you
- In your favour
- More openings than people looking — employers are competing for candidates.
- Balanced
- Openings and candidates are roughly matched.
- Competitive
- More people looking than openings — expect to compete.
- Mixed evidence
- Sources disagree, or the same occupation group is short in one part and oversupplied in another.
Every source resolves to one of these four, so there is a single vocabulary to learn. What differs is the evidence behind it, which is printed underneath each verdict — a measured ratio of openings to jobseekers, or an assessment published by a national body.
How this job compares with other jobs in the same country
- Strong
- Among the strongest in that country
- Good
- Stronger than most jobs in that country
- Mixed
- About typical for that country
- Weak
- Weaker than most jobs in that country
This is a rank within one country, not a score you can carry across borders — the registers behind two countries count different people, so the same number means different things in each. It is also why a job can be among the strongest in a country and still show as Competitive: it leads the field in a market that is crowded overall.
Where these come from
Every figure is published by a national statistics office, a public employment service or an EU body, and each card names its source and the period it covers. Some places are counted monthly, others assessed once or twice a year, so two places on the same map can be describing different moments — the date is always shown.
None of this predicts one person’s chances. It describes a market.
Reported demand · Typical pay · Where it is heading (United States, Ireland, Australia, Malta, United Kingdom)
| Reported demand | Typical pay | Where it is heading | |
|---|---|---|---|
| United States | Not reported | $83,680 2025-05 | +4.6% 2024–2034 · BLS 2024-2034 |
| Ireland | Not reported | — | +28.4% 2023–2035 · Cedefop 2026 * |
| Australia | Shortage reported Jobs and Skills Australia 2025 * | — | — |
| Malta | Shortage reported ELA/EURES 2024 * | — | +75.6% 2023–2035 · Cedefop 2026 * |
| United Kingdom | Not reported | £45,538 2025-provisional | — |
* Published for occupation groups, not for individual job titles.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (OEWS)
Source: Office for National Statistics, Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, Open Government Licence v3.0
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Future Outlook for accountant
The outlook for accountant reflects a balanced mix of automation exposure and durable, human-led work.
How are these scores calculated?
The Resilience Score (0–100) estimates how structurally protected this occupation is from automation and AI disruption, based on task-level analysis. Higher scores mean more human-judgment-intensive tasks. AI Exposure shows the estimated percentage of task hours that current AI capabilities could affect. These are model-derived structural indicators, not predictions about individual job security.
How could accountant change as AI adoption grows?
Several task areas may shift toward AI-assisted workflows, so reskilling becomes more important.
Illustrative scenario based on task automatability — not a forecast. Values are rounded the further ahead you look.
Several task areas may shift toward AI-assisted workflows, so reskilling becomes more important.
Illustrative scenario based on task automatability — not a forecast. Values are rounded the further ahead you look.
Model-based estimate. Use it as a planning signal, not a guarantee.
Compare this to your profile
How AI may change this role
Deterministic, model-based interpretation of current role signals — not a guarantee of replacement.
What still depends on people
- follow the statutory obligations
- perform balance sheet operations
- explain accounting records
Where AI may become a co-pilot
- interpret financial statements
- identify accounting errors
- analyse financial performance of a company
Tasks most exposed to automation
- check accounting records
- prepare financial statements
- prepare trial accounting balances
Vital Signs & AI Vectors
AI Exposure Vectors
0-100%Exposure to AI-assisted analysis, pattern recognition, and predictive modelling tasks
Exposure to workflow automation, decision-support software, and process digitisation
Exposure to content generation, creative augmentation, and large language model tools
Exposure to physical automation, robotics, and sensor-driven task displacement
Technical Details
NexFuture v3.0 estimates automation exposure natively from ESCO essential-skill groups, weighted by skill mass and calibrated against expert anchors. Scores are probabilistic estimates, not guarantees. See the NexFuture Methodology White Paper for full details.
Measures automation exposure. It does not measure pay, demand, or how many jobs exist near you.
What people in this role usually do
Management & Entrepreneurship
A typical day as an accountant
09 09:00 · Morning check accounting records
10 10:30 · Mid-morning analyse financial performance of a company
12 12:00 · Midday attach accounting certificates to accounting transactions
14 14:00 · Afternoon calculate tax
15 15:30 · Late afternoon ensure compliance with accounting conventions
17 17:00 · Wrap-up draft accounting procedures
Task order is illustrative. Individual days vary.
What you need to do this work
The skills, knowledge and tools this role calls for — and the traits and rewards that come with it.
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interpret financial statements
Read, understand, and interpret the key lines and indicators in financial statements. Extract the most important information from financial statements depending on the needs and integrate this information in the development of the department's plans.
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identify accounting errors
Trace accounts, revise the accuracy of the records, and determine the faults in order to solve them.
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analyse financial performance of a company
Analyse the performance of the company in financial matters in order to identify improvement actions that could increase profit, based on accounts, records, financial statements and external information of the market.
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check accounting records
Revise the accounting records of the quarter and year and ensure that the accounting information reflects with accuracy the financial transactions of the company.
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prepare financial statements
Collect, entry, and prepare the set of financial records disclosing the financial position of a company at the end of a certain period or accounting year. The financial statements consisting of five parts which are the statement of financial position, the statement of comprehensive income, the statement of changes in equity (SOCE), the statement of cash flows and notes.
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prepare trial accounting balances
Ensure that all transactions are recorded in the books of the company and totalise all the debits and the credits of the accounts to find out balance in the accounts.
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prepare tax returns forms
Totalise all the deductible tax collected during the quarter or fiscal year in order to fill tax return forms and claim it back to the governmental authorities for declaring taxation liability. Keep the documents and records supporting the transaction.
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calculate tax
Calculate the taxes which have to be paid by an individual or organisation, or paid back by a governmental institution, compliant with specific legislation.
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perform balance sheet operations
Make up a balance sheet displaying an overview of the organisation's current financial situation. Take into account income and expenses; fixed assets such as buildings and land; intangible assets such as trademarks and patents.
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manage accounts
Manage the accounts and financial activities of an organisation, supervising that all the documents are correctly maintained, that all the information and calculations are correct, and that proper decisions are being made.
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follow the statutory obligations
Understand, abide by, and apply the statutory obligations of the company in the daily performance of the job.
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draft accounting procedures
Lay down standard methods and guidelines to regulate bookkeeping and accounting operations, including determining the bookkeeping system used to record financial transactions.
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explain accounting records
Provide additional explanation and disclosure to staff, vendors, auditors, and to any other instance about the way accounts were recorded and treated in the financial records.
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ensure compliance with accounting conventions
Exercise accounting management and abidance by generally accepted accounting conventions such as recording transactions at the current price, quantifying goods, separating personal accounts of managers from those of the company, making effective the transfer of legal ownership of assets in its realisation time, and ensuring the principle of materiality.
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attach accounting certificates to accounting transactions
Collate and link documents such as invoices, contracts, and payment certificates in order to back up the transactions made in the accounting of the company.
accounting department processes
The different processes, duties, jargon, role in an organisation, and other specificities of the accounting department within an organisation such as bookkeeping, invoices, recording, and taxing.
commercial law
The legal regulations that govern a specific commercial activity.
depreciation
The accounting method of dividing the value of an asset over its useful life for the allocation of cost per fiscal year and in parallel to decrease the value of the asset from the accounts of the company.
financial department processes
The different processes, duties, jargon, role in an organisation, and other specificities of the financial department within an organisation. Understanding of financial statements, investments, disclosing policies, etc.
film production process
The various development stages of making a film, such as scriptwriting, financing, shooting, editing, and distribution.
- accounting entries
- accounting techniques
- bookkeeping regulations
- financial statements
- fraud detection
- statistics
- tax legislation
Path to become an accountant
What it typically takes to qualify: education level, where it is a regulated profession, and where to study.
Bachelor's or equivalent level
Regulated in 21 countries on record. Minimum EQF 4–7, depending on the country.
Reflects the EU regulated-professions database. Not legal advice — confirm requirements with the relevant national authority before relying on this for a career or immigration decision.
2,145 programmes in 28 countries teach the core skills of this job. Plus 345 short courses that build single skills.
A few examples, taught in the language of this page:
MASTER OF SCIENCE IN ACCOUNTING
University of Limerick · Ireland
Honours Bachelor of Science in Accounting
University College Cork · Ireland
PG Diploma in Accounting
Technological University Dublin · Ireland
Economics and Business Economics
Rijksuniversiteit Groningen · the Netherlands
Accounting and Finance
Technological University Dublin · Ireland
These are 6 of 2,490.
Sources
- 1. Source: Europass Qualification Dataset Register (European Commission)
- 2. Bron: DUO open onderwijsdata
Growth Pathways & Similar Roles
Explore typical career progression paths, adjacent skills, and similar roles to plan your next transition.
Where does accountant fit?
Similarity scores based on skill overlap from ESCO data.
For organisations
The data on this page, working for your students, clients and staff.
Frequently asked questions
What skills are most important for an accountant?
Can I work as an accountant in private practice?
What kind of education is required to become an accountant?
How much does Accountant pay in the United States?
Is Accountant a regulated profession?
Sources: ESCO O*NET ELA/EURES Cedefop BLS Data updated October 3, 2026 About our data