Saida S.
asked • 09/01/14you borrow $50 from mom and $50 from dad. you buy a shirt for $97 and get $3 change
You borrow $50 from mom and $50 from dad. You buy a shirt for $97 and get back $3 in change. You give $1 back to mom and $1 back to dad. You keep $1 for yourself.
Now you owe each of your parents $49.
$49+$49=$98 You still have $1. $98+$1=$99.
What happened to the other dollar?
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2 Answers By Expert Tutors
Diego H. answered • 09/01/14
Tutor
New to Wyzant
"Come with me if you want to pass"
50 + 50 = 100.
100 - 97 = 3.
3 - 1 - 1 = 1.
You owe each of your parents 49 dollars, but you shouldn't account for the 1 dollar you have.
2 * 49 = 98 + the two dollars you paid them. And 98 = 97 shirt + 1 dollar you kept.
100 = 97 shirt + 1 dollar you kept + 2 dollars you paid parents
Matthew B.
Are you going to just completely disregard the fact that you owe your parents $98 after paying them back $2 and the $1 in liquid assets you have remaining somehow add a dollar onto your debt? (98+1=99) for a tutor on this site I’d expect you to understand basic math and point out that flaw right away. Either that or the parents decided to teach their child how real debt works and charged a $1 interest fee therefor mitigating the $1 they had saved, but this is highly unlikely and you failed to mention that as well so it’s irrelevant. Basically your answer is extra af. You show us all this rudimentary math that would bore a 1st grader; thinking your teaching people older than 5 something useful while disregarding the issues with the math in the original question like it doesn’t exist.
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03/09/21
Danny P.
this also has absolutely nothing to do with accounting, so not sure why you're a try hard and approaching the question that way. the question is literally "where did the last dollar go?", not, "what's the bottom-line financial impact of my personal finances with outstanding debt and liabilities towards my parents". lmao mf lame
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03/15/21
Raul J C.
That's a trick question. Obviously if you give them 1 coin each and then you owe them 49 each you will need to produce not 49 coins but 48.50 to use the dollar you already have.
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05/25/22
Connor S.
I gave my values for this answer in terms of 2(value/2), simply because the kid has two parents to which they theoretically owe an equal amount of money. So in essence, 2($50) moves from parents to their kid. The kid spends 2($48.5) on the shirt and has 2($1.5) remaining. The kid decides to return 2($1), keeping 2($0.5) in their possession. This means that in total kid owes 2($48.5) + 2($0.5) = 2($49), and the kid's parents are still missing 2($49). Note that 2($49) = 2($49). So no, the dollar elf did not take any extra dollar into the dollar dimension. And no, one cannot use the same logic to describe where our missing socks go after we run them through the laundry ;(
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07/12/24
Arthur D. answered • 09/01/14
Tutor
4.9
(283)
Mathematics Tutor With a Master's Degree In Mathematics
If you borrow $100 and buy a shirt for $97, you get $3 back. If you gave your parents the $3 that you got back, then you would only owe them $97, but you only gave them back $2, so you owe them $98. You kept the other dollar. You should have given them that extra $1 so you would only owe them $97. In other words, you don't add the $1 to the $98 you owe your parents, you should give them the $1 and then subtract $1 from the $98 you owe them and you will now only owe them $97. When you gave them each $1, you subtracted $1 from $50 for each parent-that's how you got $49 !! Why would you want to add that leftover $1 to the $98 ? If you give them that $1, you subtract it from the $98 to get $97 which is what you owe for the cost of the shirt.
Matthew B.
Also why would you want that leftover $1 maybe he uses it to buy a container of Minute Maid lemonade and sells it at his lemonade stand for $15 at .5 a cup. That’s a good way to pay off debt and learn how capitalism works.
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03/09/21
Raul J C.
Is simple math.. you can do it the way the problem says.. but keeping that dollar is an ilusion cz you still have to produce the money. Even if you keep the dollar at the end you end up giving it back when you pay your debt of 49 dollars each. Let's say you kept that dollar. You only have to produce 48.50 for each.
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05/25/22
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