After leaving the polls, many people are asked how they voted. Concerning propositions A,B, and C the following info was obtained. 294 voted yes on A, 90 voted yes only on A, 346 voted yes on B, 166 voted yes only on B, 517 voted yes on A or B, 339 voted yes on C, no one voted yes on all three and 72 voted no on all three. What percent of the voters voted yes on more than one proposition. First draw a big square or rectangle to hold all the voters:Next draw a circle to hold all the voters who voted yes on A and label it A:
Next draw a circle overlapping the first to hold all the voters who voted yes on B and label it B. (The overlapping part will contain the voters who voted yes on both A and B).
Next draw a circle overlapping the first two circles to hold all the voters who voted for C and label it C.
This gives us 8 regions to classify voters with according to what they voted yes on: We will assume that every voter voted either yes or no on all three. The statements which immediately give us complete information about any of the 8 regions are these: 90 voted yes only on A 166 voted yes only on B no one voted yes for all three 72 voted no on all three So we will fill these numbers in the proper regions:
Then we'll assign unknowns x,y,z, and w for the numbers of voters in the remaining regions: "...294 voted yes on A..." So we get our first equation by adding up the parts of circle A and setting it equal to 294 which simplifies to "...346 voted yes on B..." So we get our second equation by adding up the parts of circle B and setting it equal to 346 which simplifies to "...517 voted yes on A or B..." So we get our third equation by adding up all the parts of both circles A and B and setting it equal to 517 which simplifies to "...339 voted yes on C..." So we get our fourth equation by adding up the parts of circle C and setting it equal to 339: So we have his system of 4 equations in 4 unknowns: Solve that system and get Now we replace the unknown letters by these numbers: Now we add up all the numbers to get the total number of voters: So there were 790 voters. The question asks: >>...What percent of the voters voted yes on more than one proposition..." 123 voted yes on A and B 81 voted yes on A and C 57 voted yes on B and C So The fraction who voted on more than one proposition is therefore Changing this to a percent, 33.03797468% Edwin