What are the main reasons why financial accounting and management accounting are separated from traditional accounting?

Management accounting and financial accounting are separated from financial accounting, which are intrinsically and inevitably related to organizational system and management science theory.

Essentially, management accounting is still an economic information system. It is the product of the development of accounting science to marginal accounting and comprehensive accounting. It is a comprehensive subject developed on the basis of financial accounting and organically integrating the contents of other related disciplines. Mathematicization of accounting is an important feature of management accounting.

For example, in management accounting, the currency-based measurement method is developing to adopt a variety of comprehensive measurement methods. Single monetary measurement makes accounting reflect dullness, one-sidedness and monotony, which can't meet the requirements of comprehensive management of enterprises; In management accounting, the quantity and amount of materials, the number of employees and labor costs are listed side by side, which makes accounting information more comprehensive and intuitive.

The difference between management accounting and financial accounting is not only manifested in the diversification of methods, but also in another important difference: management accounting strives to provide a basis for long-term and short-term future decisions of enterprises, so it pays special attention to the use of time value of money, that is, taking interest as the opportunity cost of capital use, thus promoting the more effective use of funds.

In addition, from the accounting subject, financial accounting often takes the whole enterprise as the accounting subject for external reporting, while management accounting tends to take the responsible unit within the enterprise as the accounting subject to measure the operating performance of each department and finally evaluate the operating activities of the whole enterprise. Therefore, in management accounting, the meaning of accounting subjects is flexible.