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You can put this solution on YOUR website!
\n" ); document.write( "There are an endless number of ways to solve this problem using formal algebra; you have received two responses showing two of those ways.
\n" ); document.write( "I would certainly not use the method shown by tutor @Mananth. She has the strange habit of representing whole numbers using 2 decimal places.
\n" ); document.write( "The solution from tutor @MathTherapy is more straightforward.
\n" ); document.write( "I would start the way he did but then go a different direction with it.
\n" ); document.write( "Subtracting the two equations formed from the given information gives the result that the cost of one shirt and one pair of pants is $37.50:
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\n" ); document.write( "Instead of solving that equation for one variable in terms of the other and finishing the problem using substitution, I would continue with elimination.
\n" ); document.write( "Informally, finishing the problem using elimination could go something like this:
\n" ); document.write( "one shirt and one pair of pants cost $37.50
\n" ); document.write( "so two shirts and two pairs of pants cost 2($37.50)=$75
\n" ); document.write( "but three shirts and two pairs of pants cost $85.50, so one shirt costs $85.50-$75=$10.50.
\n" ); document.write( "and then one pair of pants costs $37.50-$10.50=$27.
\n" ); document.write( "The formal algebra for finishing the problem by that path looks like this:
\n" ); document.write( "(1) x+y=$37.50 (from the two original equations)
\n" ); document.write( "(2) 2x+2y=2($37.50)=$75 (doubling (1))
\n" ); document.write( "(3) 3x+2y=$85.50 (one of the original equations)
\n" ); document.write( "(4) x=$85.50-$75=$10.50 (comparing (2) and (3))
\n" ); document.write( "(5) y=$37.50-$10.50=$27 (from (1) and (4))
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