industry Who Controls the Money on a Film Production?

Is there one person mainly who has to approve the expenditure of funds?
a producer, accountant...
If a cameraman or set designer needs a new piece of equipment that must be purchased...
would they have to go to that person and ask permission?
would they have to go up a chain of command? If so, what would that be?
 
There are producers and there are producers :)

There's usually one producer who is ultimately in charge of decision making, and decides what can be spent.

There certainly is a chain of command for big ticket items.
Generally the department head to the director to the (decision making) producer.
And yeah, there can be more than one producer involved in that decision.
 
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Is there one person mainly who has to approve the expenditure of funds?
a producer, accountant...
If a cameraman or set designer needs a new piece of equipment that must be purchased...
would they have to go to that person and ask permission?
would they have to go up a chain of command? If so, what would that be?
The producer is the person who approves expenditure funds. If a department
head need something that is not in the budget they have to go to the producer
and ask for the additional funds.
I have read that the titles of producer and maybe exec prod are now almost meaningless
Am I wrong here?
if not, it would change the answer to the question, wouldn't it?
You are kind of wrong. And kind of right.

There is a producer (or producers) who do the job of producing the project.
There are people who get that title for doing something like bringing name
talent to the project. Many people listed as executive producer do very little
actual, day-to-day work during production but have worked in various capacities
to make the project happen.

It doesn't change the answer to the question. The cameraman or set designer
who needs a new piece of equipment will go to the producer in charge, not the
person who has gotten the title for a different reason.
 
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