Growth Question

Question

A town's population has been growing linearly. In 2003 the population was 65,000. The population has been growing by 1200 people each year. Write an equation for the population, P,  years after 2003.

Answer 1

Since we the population is growing linearly we will be using y=mx+b as our formate. (p=mx+b because they ask you to use p for the population.)

B is our y intercept. In this case the y intercept is going to be were the population started in 2003(65,000)

m is our slope that can be found by knowing how much the population is increasing every year(1,200)

Putting what we know together we will have...

p=1200x+65000

Answer 2

The equation that represents that growth is P = 65000 + 1200X.

For example, 2 years after 2003, the population would be 65000 + 2 x 1200 = 67400.