Question 9845
Let's deal with the shirts and shorts first. They said that they sold twice more T-shirts than shorts. This translates to {{{ T = 2S }}}. T for T-shirt, S for shorts. Say WHAT!? If there were more shirts sold, then why do the shorts get the 2 multiplied to it!? Since there are less shorts sold than shirts, as the problem says, the shorts are the ones that need to be multiplied by 2 to equal the number of shirts sold.


So, the money collected from selling shorts is {{{ 14S }}}. The money collected from selling shirts is {{{ 9T }}}. We have to add these two totals to come up with a grand total of $256.00:


{{{ 14S + 9T = 256 }}} <---------- Start here


{{{ 14S + 9(2S) = 256 }}} <-------- We substituted 2S for T because of the relationship given to us (that there are twice more shirts than shorts). This way, we'll be solving an equation with only one variable.


{{{ 14S + 18S = 256 }}} <----- simplified


{{{ 32S = 256 }}} <------ combined like terms


{{{ S = 8 }}} <-------- There were 8 shorts sold. If there were twice more shirts, then there were 16 shirts sold.