Fixed asset in the context of "Asset"

Infrastructure (also known as "capital goods", or "fixed capital") is a platform for governance, commerce, and economic growth and is "a lifeline for modern societies". It is the hallmark of economic development.

It has been characterized as the mechanism that delivers the "..fundamental needs of society: food, water, energy, shelter, governance ... without infrastructure, societies disintegrate and people die." Adam Smith argued that fixed asset spending was the "third rationale for the state, behind the provision of defense and justice." Societies enjoy the use of "...highway, waterway, air, and rail systems that have allowed the unparalleled mobility of people and goods. Water-borne diseases are virtually nonexistent because of water and wastewater treatment, distribution, and collection systems. In addition, telecommunications and power systems have enabled our economic growth."

Gross fixed capital formation (GFCF) is a component of the expenditure on gross domestic product (GDP) that indicates how much of the new value added in an economy is invested rather than consumed. It measures the value of acquisitions of new or existing fixed assets by the business sector, governments, and "pure" households (excluding their unincorporated enterprises) minus disposals of fixed assets.

GFCF is a macroeconomic concept used in official national accounts such as the United Nations System of National Accounts (UNSNA), National Income and Product Accounts (NIPA), and the European System of Accounts (ESA). The concept dates back to the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) studies of Simon Kuznets of capital formation in the 1930s, and standard measures for it were adopted in the 1950s.

Accelerated depreciation refers to any one of several methods by which a company, for 'financial accounting' or tax purposes, depreciates a fixed asset in such a way that the amount of depreciation taken each year is higher during the earlier years of an asset's life. For financial accounting purposes, accelerated depreciation is expected to be much more productive during its early years, so that depreciation expense will more accurately represent how much of an asset's usefulness is being used up each year. For tax purposes, accelerated depreciation provides a way of deferring corporate income taxes by reducing taxable income in current years, in exchange for increased taxable income in future years. This is a valuable tax incentive that encourages businesses to purchase new assets.

For financial reporting purposes, the two most popular methods of accelerated depreciation are the double declining balance method and the sum-of-the-years’ digits method. For tax purposes, the allowable methods of accelerated depreciation depend on the tax law that the taxpayer is subject to. In the United States, the two currently allowable depreciation methods for tax purposes are both accelerated depreciation methods (ACRS and MACRS).

The marginal efficiency of capital (MEC) is that rate of discount which would equate the price of a fixed capital asset with its present discounted value of expected income.

The term “marginal efficiency of capital” was introduced by John Maynard Keynes in his General Theory, and defined as “the rate of discount which would make the present value of the series of annuities given by the returns expected from the capital asset during its life just equal its supply price”.

In finance, a revaluation of fixed assets is an action that may be required to accurately describe the true value of the capital goods a business owns. This should be distinguished from planned depreciation, where the recorded decline in the value of an asset is tied to its age.

Fixed assets are held by an enterprise for the purpose of producing goods or rendering services, as opposed to being held for resale for the normal course of business. An example, machines, buildings, patents, or licenses can be fixed assets of a business.