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amount that petitioner may have had on hand at the end of the
taxable period. The invoices for the sand and gravel and other
materials show periodic purchases in the tens of thousands of
dollars. Accordingly, sufficiently large quantities of these
items may have been on hand at any particular time, including the
end of the taxable year. Petitioner was constructing
foundations, sidewalks, and driveways in large subdivisions, so
it is likely that at any particular time petitioner maintained a
relatively large quantity of sand and gravel at the job site.
Petitioner has provided no specific evidence as to the amount of
these items on hand or that they were, in fact, without a
significant effect on the amount of income that would have been
reported under the accrual method. The majority accepts, without
any corroboration, testimony that the amount of sand and gravel
on hand was small. Petitioner, however, kept no records of the
inventory of sand, gravel, and other materials on hand and was
not able to show the amount of materials on hand. Considering
the heavy burden imposed here, a taxpayer should not be able to
show that respondent’s determination was arbitrary by the simple
expedient of stating that any difference in accounting method is
“small”. Petitioner paid the suppliers for these items, and
accordingly they were contained in petitioner’s “cost of goods
sold” shown on the return. It should also be noted that
petitioner included the cost of the concrete in its cost of goods
sold and that hardened concrete existed in the form of work in
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