SOLUTION: Ben bought a pad of paper, a pencil, an eraser, and a compass for $1.80. The compass cost twice as much as the paper. The eraser cost a third as much as the compass. The pencil

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Question 29935: Ben bought a pad of paper, a pencil, an eraser, and a compass for $1.80. The compass cost twice as much as the paper. The eraser cost a third as much as the compass. The pencil cost half as much as the eraser. How much did each item cost?
Found 2 solutions by Cintchr, Paul:
Answer by Cintchr(481) (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Ohh ... I like this one. First lets define what we know.

now we are going to do some substitution

where we see "pencil" plug in (1/2)eraser

where we see "eraser" we plug in (1/2)compass

where we see "compass" we plug in 2paper

where we see "paper" plug in 'a'

multiply the parts with multiple numbers
now add up the 'a'
have to go to an improper fraction here not a mixed number. change $1.80 to to 9/5 in fraction form.
multiply both sides by 2/9
cancel and reduce

lets look back at our given info:

plug theese values in to the final equation

YES!! we did it right!

Answer by Paul(988) (Show Source):
You can put this solution on YOUR website!
Let the paper be x
Let the compass be 2x
Eraser = 3(2x)
Pencil = 6x/2

Total:

x=0.15 (paper)
2(0.15)=0.3 (compass)

3(0.3)=0.9 (eraser)

6(0.15)/2=0.45 (pencil)

Hence, the paper is for $0.15, a pencil is for $0.45, a eraser is for $0.9 and a compass is for $0.3
Paul.