 Until 1977, ethics rules prevented accounting and auditing firms from advertising to clients. When the rules were lifted, spending by the largest CPA firms on advertisements rose from US $ 4 million in the 1980s to more than $ 100 million in the 2000s. Critics claimed that, by allowing the firms to advertise, the business side overstepped the professional side of the profession, which led to a conflict of interest. This focus allowed for occurrences of fraud, and caused the firms, according to Arthur Bowman, "... to offer services that made them more consultants and business advisers than auditors." As accounting firms became less interested in the lower-paying audits due to more focus on higher earning services such as consulting, problems arose. This disregard for the lack of time spent on audits resulted in a lack of attention to catching creative and fraudulent accounting.
