• 54.4 percent said: "Yes. Complex accounting rules make it easier to commit fraud."
• 43.2 percent said: "No. It has nothing to do with the complexity of the rules and all to do with business ethics."
• 2.4 percent said "none of the above."

Several respondents added their two cents:

"It is not the complex accountig rules that make it easier to defraud, it is the simple fact that any accounting system will have possibilities to hide fraud. Fraud can often be attributed to lack in proper controls or overrides of existing controls. The complex rules are clearly for a purpose, what one might wonder every now and then is how or even if these rules are actually enforceable. The rules could create a myth of security where system approaches to (internal) audit and sampling are used to evaluate the accounts."

"Even the highly complex accounting used by Enron was not unfathomable to sophisticated analysts. If the market players had asked the questions, the scheme would have fallen apart very quickly. However, money rather than morals or fudiuciary responsibilities drove their ethical blindness."

"Complex accounting rules are in most cases a waste of time and money. The same results could be achieved without all the mental gymnastics that has been created to bolster someone's ego. Someone obviously thinks it is fun to play the 'mind games.'"

"Fraud is simple greed. It does not have to be complex. Limited control by upper level individuals is all it takes."

"No matter what the rules are, it is the intent of the individual(s) involved. Rules may make it easier or harder to see, but it is the ethics behind the 'transaction.' Ethics are not something taught in B school -- it is taught long before grade school. Our society has always looked for a reason, scapgoat, etc. when things have gone wrong. We do not face the facts."

*125 respondents participated in the survey between Dec. 27, 2006, and Feb. 3, 2006.

Go to the Opinion Poll page.