Pending Rules on Government Aid Needless: Corporate Executives

Some of the nation’s largest companies are resisting pending accounting changes that would require them to disclose the magnitude of their government support—some $100 billion of total funds that some watchdog groups say investors know very little about.

The changes, being developed by the Financial Accounting Standards board, would require companies to disclose, for the first time, the nature and terms of tax abatements and other legally enforceable government incentives they receive. Government incentives can include, for example, acquired land, or an abatement that relieves a company from paying property tax, sales and use tax or payroll tax.

Executives from ...