Carson, Pirie, Scott & Company v. United States

ENOCH, Circuit Judge.

Plaintiff, an operator of retail department stores, seeks to recover part of the federal income and excess profits taxes paid for the fiscal years ending January 31, 1944, through 1948, through recomputation of its taxable income for those years by the retail inventory method on a last in, first out basis (popularly called “LIFO”) although it was stipulated that plaintiff filed its returns for those years using the retail inventory method on a first in, first out basis (popularly called “FIFO”) without any accompanying election to use LIFO.

Under FIFO the goods left in an…