How to Become a Public Accountant
What is a Public Accountant
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a Public Accountant. For example, did you know that they make an average of $29.84 an hour? That's $62,057 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 6% and produce 90,700 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Public Accountant Do
There are certain skills that many Public Accountants have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed Analytical skills, Communication skills and Detail oriented.
How To Become a Public Accountant
If you're interested in becoming a Public Accountant, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 76.7% of Public Accountants have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 10.0% of Public Accountants have master's degrees. Even though most Public Accountants have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a Public Accountant. When we researched the most common majors for a Public Accountant, we found that they most commonly earn Bachelor's Degree degrees or Master's Degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on Public Accountant resumes include Associate Degree degrees or Diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a Public Accountant. In fact, many Public Accountant jobs require experience in a role such as Accountant. Meanwhile, many Public Accountants also have previous career experience in roles such as Staff Accountant or Controller.
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And if you’re looking for a job, here are the five top employers hiring now:
Public Accountant Career Paths
In addition to switching up your job search, it might prove helpful to look at a career path for your specific job. Now, what's a career path you ask? Well, it's practically a map that shows how you might advance from one job title to another. Our career paths are especially detailed with salary changes. So, for example, if you started out with the role of Accountant you might progress to a role such as Tax Accountant eventually. Later on in your career, you could end up with the title Tax Manager.
Public Accountant Jobs You Might Like
What is the right job for my career path?
Tell us your goals and we'll match you with the rights job to get there.
Average Salary for a Public Accountant
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Choose From 10+ Customizable Public Accountant Resume templates
Zippia allows you to choose from different easy-to-use Public Accountant templates, and provides you with expert advice. Using the templates, you can rest assured that the structure and format of your Public Accountant resume is top notch. Choose a template with the colors, fonts & text sizes that are appropriate for your industry.
Public Accountant Demographics
Public Accountant Gender Distribution
After extensive research and analysis, Zippia's data science team found that:
- Among Public Accountants, 48.0% of them are women, while 52.0% are men.
- The most common race/ethnicity among Public Accountants is White, which makes up 66.7% of all Public Accountants.
- The most common foreign language among Public Accountants is Spanish at 40.5%.
Find the best Public Accountant job for you
Public Accountant Jobs You Might Like
- High Paying Public Accountant Jobs - $85K and Up
- Work From Home Public Accountant Jobs
- Entry Level Public Accountant Jobs
- Part Time Public Accountant Jobs
- Actively Hiring
- No Degree Public Accountant Jobs
Top Colleges for Public Accountants
1. University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA • Private
2. Northwestern University
Evanston, IL • Private
3. University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA • Private
4. SUNY at Binghamton
Vestal, NY • Private
5. Villanova University
Villanova, PA • Private
6. San Diego State University
San Diego, CA • Private
7. Bentley University
Waltham, MA • Private
8. SUNY Farmingdale
Farmingdale, NY • Private
9. Boston University
Boston, MA • Private
10. SUNY Stony Brook
Stony Brook, NY • Private
Find the best Public Accountant job for you
Public Accountant Jobs You Might Like
- High Paying Public Accountant Jobs - $85K and Up
- Work From Home Public Accountant Jobs
- Entry Level Public Accountant Jobs
- Part Time Public Accountant Jobs
- Actively Hiring
- No Degree Public Accountant Jobs
Online Courses For Public Accountant That You May Like
Payroll calculations - federal income tax, social security, Medicare - Payroll journal entries posted to ledger accounts...
Subsidiary ledgers for accounts receivable & accounts payable. Special Journals - Sales journal, purchases journal...
Adjusting entry creation, posting adjusting entries to a worksheet, creating financial statements from the trial balance...
Top Skills For a Public Accountant
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 17.6% of Public Accountants listed CPA on their resume, but soft skills such as Analytical skills and Communication skills are important as well.
Best States For a Public Accountant
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a Public Accountant. The best states for people in this position are New York, Virginia, Massachusetts, and New Jersey. Public Accountants make the most in New York with an average salary of $88,177. Whereas in Virginia and Massachusetts, they would average $77,313 and $73,980, respectively. While Public Accountants would only make an average of $73,162 in New Jersey, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. New York
$88,177
Avg. Salary
2. District of Columbia
$84,897
Avg. Salary
3. Rhode Island
$72,005
Avg. Salary