As the business environment quickly changes, CPAs are increasingly being called upon to help clients make sense of it.

With AI transforming how companies operate, inflation and interest rates influencing business decisions, tariffs creating uncertainty for some industries and California’s changing regulatory and tax landscape, the challenges and opportunities for CPAs and their clients are piling up.

CalCPA’s recent Town Hall tackled those topics with guests Gene Marks, CPA, business analyst, author and nationally recognized columnist, and Loren Kaye, California political and policy expert and former president of the California Foundation for Commerce and Education.

While the conversation ranged from AI to the economy to California ballot measures, a common theme emerged: CPAs have an important role in helping businesses navigate uncertainty.

AI: From Disruption to Opportunity

AI may generate plenty of headlines about its potential risks, but Marks encouraged CPAs to look beyond the broad debate over the technology and consider the practical opportunities emerging for the profession.

In California, in particular, new requirements surrounding how businesses use AI could create a developing area of expertise for CPAs.

Marks pointed to requirements involving audits of how companies use AI, including whether the technology is being used in employment decisions or other decisions affecting workers.

“It’s like the Wild West,” Marks said, describing the emerging landscape. For CPAs willing to develop expertise in the area, he sees an opportunity to become a trusted resource as businesses try to understand and comply with new requirements.

He also sees AI itself becoming increasingly embedded in everyday business.

“AI itself is becoming a utility,” Marks said. “It is becoming necessary. We’re all using it already as part of our daily lives.”

At the same time, Marks argued that regulation will need to strike a balance—providing appropriate safeguards without unnecessarily restricting innovation and growth.

For CPAs, that balance creates another opportunity: helping clients understand not only how to use AI, but also how to manage the risks and responsibilities that come with it.

A New Normal for Inflation and Interest Rates?

Marks also offered a longer-term perspective on inflation and interest rates.

Rather than viewing today’s inflation primarily through the lens of temporary factors such as energy prices or supply-chain disruptions, Marks said CPAs and business owners should consider the possibility that higher inflation and interest rates are becoming part of the operating environment.

He suggested that businesses should build approximately 3 percent to 4 percent inflation and 6 percent to 7 percent interest rates into longer-term forecasts.

The numbers are not necessarily a crisis, Marks emphasized. Instead, they represent a business environment that requires adjustment.

His message to CPAs: Help clients plan for the environment they are actually operating in rather than waiting for a return to the unusually low inflation and interest rates that characterized much of the period before the pandemic.

Tariffs Add Another Layer of Uncertainty

Tariffs were another issue complicating business planning.

Marks noted that ongoing legal and policy challenges have made the tariff environment difficult to predict—yet many businesses have so far found ways to adapt.

Some companies are absorbing higher costs, while others are passing price increases along to customers or adjusting their supply chains.

The impact, he said, varies significantly by industry and by how dependent a company is on products sourced from countries subject to tariffs.

For CPAs, that means understanding how tariff exposure affects individual clients rather than assuming a one-size-fits-all impact.

California’s Policy Landscape

Kaye shifted the conversation to California, where several ballot measures could have implications for taxpayers, businesses and the state budget.

He discussed Proposition 40, describing it as the most prominent of the measures under discussion and outlining the competing political and business interests surrounding it. Kaye also discussed Propositions 41 and 42, focusing on their provisions related to government accountability, transparency and taxation of financial assets.

Because the measures were still part of an ongoing political campaign, Kaye highlighted the range of positions being taken by political, labor and business organizations rather than presenting a single consensus view.

The broader takeaway for CPAs is that California’s tax and regulatory environment remains an important factor in business planning—and one worth watching closely.

Keeping Clients Focused Amid the Noise

Perhaps the most practical message of the Town Hall came near the end of the discussion. With so much economic and political noise competing for attention, Marks said business owners need to remain focused on what they can control: running their businesses and serving their customers.

That points to an important role for CPAs: Whether the issue is AI, inflation, interest rates, tariffs or changing regulations, clients increasingly need advisers who can translate complicated developments into practical business implications. The opportunity for CPAs may be less about predicting what comes next and more about helping clients prepare for multiple possibilities.

Check out the full Town Hall on demand by registering and accessing the event in your Activities. And be a part of the next Town Hall conversation on Nov. 17.