SOLUTION: Hi
greg went shopping with 360 dollars. He bought calculator s and shirts and had $8.50 left.
each shirt cost 33 dollars and a calculator costs 17.50 . He bought 3 more shirts
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greg went shopping with 360 dollars. He bought calculator s and shirts and had $8.50 left.
each shirt cost 33 dollars and a calculator costs 17.50 . He bought 3 more shirts
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Question 1121428: Hi
greg went shopping with 360 dollars. He bought calculator s and shirts and had $8.50 left.
each shirt cost 33 dollars and a calculator costs 17.50 . He bought 3 more shirts than calculators.
how many shirts and calculators did he buy.
thanks Found 3 solutions by Boreal, greenestamps, josgarithmetic:Answer by Boreal(15235) (Show Source):
Here is a solution using logical reasoning and a bit of mental arithmetic. Compare it to the formal algebraic solution provided by the other tutor, and you will see the formal algebra does virtually the same thing as a common sense solution.
So algebra isn't magic, like it might seem at first -- it is just common sense, done in a formal way.
The given information is that he spent $351.50 on some number of calculators and a number of shirts that was 3 more than the number of calculators; the calculators cost $17.50 each and the shirts cost $33 each.
Suppose now that he goes back and buys 3 more calculators, so that the number of calculators is the same as the number of shirts. The 3 extra calculators cost $52.50; so now the total cost would be $351.50 + $52.50 = $404.
(Note it doesn't matter that that total is more money than he started with because he didn't really buy those 3 extra calculators.)
That new total cost of $404 is for the same numbers of shirts and calculators. The cost of one shirt and one calculator is $50.50; the number of shirts he bought is then $404/$50.50 = 8.
So the number of shirts he bought is 8; now take away those 3 extra calculators we added to the problem, to find that the number of calculators he bought was 5.
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