This article presents information on a decision matrix which has been designed to assist accounting students to determine which factor is to be used in lower-of-cost or market valuations. The U.S. Committee on Accounting Procedure has said that a departure from the cost basis of assigning amounts to stock-in-trade inventory is required when the utility of any given inventory is not as great as the cost. Utility may be less than cost when the net realizable value of any given inventory, when reduced by an approximately normal profit margin, is an amount less than cost, however determined. The amount of loss to be recognized when such utility has been impaired is found by pricing inventory at lower-of-cost or market. The matrix is applicable only for conditions under which lower-of-cost or market decisions can be applied. That is, where net realizable value less normal profit margin equals or exceeds cost, lower-of-cost or market is not applicable and the decision matrix should not be consulted.

This article discusses the advantages of using the case method in teaching accounting course. The case method has several advantages, particularly in attracting and holding the interest of the non business major. The case method means something different to everyone claiming to use it. In this situation, it refers, in part, to the instructor's efforts to organize the class work so that a high level of student participation was encouraged. Rather than continue the question and answer technique of instructor and student, an attempt was made to develop formats for a series of discussions. Readings from a newly adopted textbook and business periodicals, such as Fortune and Forbes, were selected and organized into four modular time segments. Case studies, placed near the beginning of each module, were selected on the basis of their relevance to the main issue considered in the module, and upon the setting of the case. A considerable effort was made to use cases in which a technologically oriented company operating in the Southwest needed to make difficult decisions based in part on accounting financial data.