Note: Graves, Sweeney and Goldmarkbilanz--Whither Sweeney and Schmidts Tabeswertbilanz?

              The Accounting Historians Journal Vol. 16, No. 1 June 1989
Graeme Dean UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY and
Frank L. Clarke UNIVERSITY OF NEWCASTLE
A NOTE: GRAVES, SWEENEY AND
GOLDMARKBILANZ
— WHITHER SWEENEY AND SCHMIDT'S
TAGESWERTBILANZ?
Abstract: Graves' [1987] very competent and well-documented de-scriptions of Mahlberg's and Schmalenbach's Goldmarkbilanz techniques should raise no objections on technical grounds. He ably captures and amplifies the mechanical aspects of these major Betriebswirtschaftslehre proposals. However, the linking of Sweeney with these Goldmarkbilanz proposals in the title and in the first few and then in the final pages of the article, is cause for concern. By only considering links with the Goldmarkbilanz techniques, Graves does less than reasonable justice to Sweeney's development of the case for Stabilized Accounting. By not considering the other major stabilization proponent, Fritz Schmidt, albeit a proponent of re-placement cost based stabilization, Graves provides only a partial explanation of the myriad of factors influencing the development of Sweeney's inflation accounting proposals.
Graves' [1987] very competent descriptions of Mahlberg's and Schmalenbach's Goldmarkbilanz (Gold mark balance sheet accounting) techniques should raise no objections on technical grounds. He ably captures and amplifies the mechanical aspects of these major Betriebswirtschaftslehre (academic discipline re-lating to theory of the firm) stabilization proposals. But, in telling only part of the story, he may do less than reasonable justice to Henry Sweeney's development of the case for Stabilized Accounting. Graves acknowledges that Schmidt [1921] contains the first comprehensive statement in the accounting literature of current value (cost) accounting. But then, (in foot-note 2) explains "[as Schmidt's organic stabilization theory was] distinct from the gold-mark model... [it] is not discussed in this study." This exclusion results in a partial presentation of the links between Henry Sweeney's ideas on inflation accounting and those already well developed by European business econo-mists, resulting, inter alia, in the German gold mark model.