Exercise 17 Page 157

We want to find the total cost of the meal. Let's start by calculating the dollar amount of the tax. We can do this by using the percent equation. part = percent * whole We are given that the meal cost $ 7.50 plus 6.5 % tax. Let t represent the dollar amount of the tax. t = 6.5 % * $ 7.50Before solving the equation we got, we need to write the percent as a decimal. We can do this by ignoring the percent symbol and moving the decimal point two places to the left.

We got that 6.5 % is equal to 0.065. t = 6.5 % * $ 7.50 [0.3em] ⇓ [0.3em] t = 0.065 * $ 7.50 Finally, we will solve the equation for t. For simplicity, we will omit the dollar symbol.

We found that t≈ 0.49 is a solution to the equation. This means that the dollar amount of the tax, rounded to the nearest cent, is about $ 0.49. Now we can calculate the total cost of the meal, which is the regular price of the meal plus the tax. Total cost ≈ $ 7.50 + $ 0.49 = $ 7.99 The total cost of the meal is about $ 7.99.