finance algebra

Question

Aileen is a sales person at Lopez sporting goods, she is paid monthly commissions on all little league outfits she receives 10% of her first $2,000 in sales and 12% of her balance in sales. Last week she earned $231.20. What was the total value of the uniforms she sold.

Answer 1

Hello, Alice,

I'll refer to the table below as I go through the logic.

Lines 1 - 3 document what we know.

I'm curious what Aileen's commission would be if she got the full $2,000 sales amount that gives her 10%. Line 4 tells us she would get $200 if she made $2,000 in sales. She made more than that by $31.20, Line 6. The Line 6 amount would have come from sales over $2,000 at the 12% rate.

That can be calculated by the equation in Line 7. Line 8 is the result, which tells us she would have had to sell $260.00 above the $2,000 target to earned the additional $31.20. Add that to the $2,000 and we get Line 9, her total sales.

I hope this helps,

Bob