rethinking, therefore questions

[Mark Johnson]

John Sowden wrote:

>3) On setting up the initial accounts, assuming that we are starting at the 
>beginning of an accounting period (year), there should be no balances in 
>income or expenses, other than the previous year's balances, which I have 
>neither looked for, not found yet.   At the beginning of the year, without 
>getting complicated (partially depreciated fixed assets, etc.), have 
>$1,000.00 in the checking account, a debit, and $1,000.00 in the equity 
>account, a credit, would make sense, but the program does not let me enter an 
>equity balance. . . .
>
>  
>
At the beginning of the year, I started with a chart of accounts.  None 
had any transactions.  I entered things such as your $1000 debit in the 
checking account as transactions against an equity account called 
"retained earnings".

I created that account manually, but my reports do seem to indicate that 
there is a built-in account for that purpose, though I'm not sure how to 
access it.

Mark