Artificial intelligence (AI) has the world in its thrall, with daily updates about new capabilities inspiring awe and fear in equal measure.
In the wake of the release of ChatGPT – the fastest growing technology platform ever – there has been talk of AI coming for the jobs of writers, artists, musicians, and coders, to name just a few.
But one profession may be safe for the time being. According to a study from Brigham Young University (BYU) in the US, human accountants still outperform ChatGPT at accounting exams.
The questions covered accounting information systems (AIS), auditing, financial accounting, managerial accounting, and tax. They varied in difficulty and type, including true v false, multiple choice, and short answers.
And ChatGPT – having previously passed law exams among others – unsurprisingly performed well. Its overall average was 47.4 per cent, doing better than human students on 11.3 per cent of questions. It did especially well on AIS and auditing.
But the students outperformed the machine overall. Their average scores came to 76.7 per cent, and they were better at questions on tax, financial, and managerial assessments, possibly because ChatGPT struggled with the mathematical processes required for the latter type.