The Mother of All Conflicts: Auditors and Their Clients.

Discusses the conflict of interest that has pervaded the corporate accounting environment in the United States. Finding that auditor independence is the only reason to require that public corporations be audited by outsiders; Resolution of the conflict of interest by the Sarbanes-Oxley ACt of 2002; Failire of audits to uncover large frauds and major financial misstatements; Ways in which auditing firms have become too cozy with corporate management to provide an independent check on management's abuse of corporate financial reports.