Evidence about the value of financial statement audit in the public sector

Abstract

Multiple, complementary explanations have been developed to explain audit demand. Substantial evidence exists for these explanations in the private sector, but they have been explored to a lesser extent in the public sector. We assess the extent to which these explanations for the value of auditing are relevant in the public sector by examining evidence from New Zealand. We find the use of overlapping explanations helps to explain how auditing is valuable to a wide variety of users.