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Journal of Accounting Research Vol. 4 No. 1 1966

The Inventory Calculus

Allan R. Drebin

Abstract

Inventory calculation procedures may be viewed as a set of linear transformations or functions which map the appropriate price and quantity vectors into a corresponding set of valuation scalars. This paper examines some of these calculations in terms of elementary matrix operations. The matrix can be readily adapted to the computer, and standard programs now exist for performing matrix algebra operations. These can be used for the required accounting calculations discussed herein. First, we consider purchase transactions; each such transaction may be described by a pair of points representing quantity and unit price, respectively. The purchase quantities, by years, may be represented by a diagonal matrix having, as the elements of its main diagonal, the quantities purchased during each accounting period. Such a matrix, Q, with typical element qji, for n accounting periods would appear as follows:

DOI
10.2307/2490142
Volume
4
Issue
1
Pages
68
Sources
bibtex:phds-export.bib openalex crossref

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