What's the absolute increase and relative increase?

Question

The population of a town increased from 3450 in 2006 to 5700 in 2009. Find the absolute and relative (percent) increase.

Answer 1

Absolute increase just refers to the simple difference between the two numbers over the two time periods, so you would subtract the number in the earlier year from the number in the later year. For your example it would be 5700 - 3450 = 2250. If this number ends up negative, it would be an absolute decrease.

Relative increase refers to the ratio of the value of the absolute increase to the value of the first number. Essentially, it tells how much growth (or decline) has occurred from the first number over the two time periods, so you would divide the number computed above by the first number. For your example it would be 2250 / 3450 = ~0.65217. This can be converted to a percent making it 65.2%.