Isn't it just that the profits from "cost centers" are harder to measure? You can't run a company without an accounting department, and good accounting can save you money. It's easy for the sales department to measure how much money it brought in, but it wouldn't have made those sales without the rest of the company. I work in tech support. The sales department makes big promises to get people to sign on the dotted line, and then we have to support their harebrained schemes, which can cost us money directly if we have to replace faulty products, or indirectly if we have to hire more people to support them. And if we didn't support our products, our sales department wouldn't be able to make their next sale. So how can you say which department is really bringing home the bacon?
If only my accounting professor would show us examples like this instead of screenshotting pages directly from our ebook and briefly reading them in class