Matrix Applications in Political and Business Settings

  • Thread starter Thread starter speed02
  • Start date Start date
AI Thread Summary
The discussion revolves around solving three matrix-related word problems in political and business contexts. The first problem involves determining the number of registered Democrats, Republicans, and Independents based on given voting percentages and totals. The second problem requires summarizing sales data of appliances in matrix form. The third problem focuses on using matrix multiplication to calculate the ingredients needed for cereal production based on specified proportions. Participants emphasize the importance of simplifying the information mathematically and suggest using ratios to aid in problem-solving. Assistance is requested in setting up equations for the first problem to facilitate finding a solution.
speed02
Messages
2
Reaction score
0
here is a word problem if someone can post how to set it up and the answer that would be great because i have to do the work any way. I did like 30 problems already and these are the only ones I am having a problems with.

Problem #1 Its in a Linear systems/matrices chapter
there are 150,000 registered democrats, Republicans, and Indepdents in a country. the number of indep. is 20% of the total number of Demo. and Rep.. In an election, 40% of the Demo. voted, 50% of the Rep., and 70% of the Indep.. The votess totaled 72,000. How many Democrats, Republicans and Independents are registered?

Problem #2 summarize the given information in matrix form
AN appliance saleswomen sold 15 washers, 8 dryers, and 13 microwave ovens in March. She sold 12 washers, 11 dryers and 6 microwave ovens in April.

Problem #3
The health fare cereal Co. makes three cereals using wheat, oats, and raisins. The proportions of each cereal are.

cereal wheat oats Raisins

Lite .75 .25 0
trim .50 .25 .25
Health Fare .25 .50 .25

use matrix Multiplication to determine the number of pounds of wheat, oats, and raisins needed to fill an order of 1480 pounds of Lite, 1840 pounds of Trim and 2050 pounds of health Fare.


Thanx in advance for the help.
 
Physics news on Phys.org
Re #1, just express what is given in mathematical terms. Example:

there are 150,000 registered democrats, Republicans, and Indepdents

means D + R + I = 150,000. Keep going from there and you'll likely have 3 equations in 3 unknowns.
 
For your first problem:

I always think that sometimes the question looks so long and wordy that it puts you off. You should think about simplifying the information mathematically first. Assign a letter to each type of voter. Then think about the information you have and try to link it with some simple formulae.

As a further hint, think about ratios. I don't know how much you know about ratios and their mathematical uses, but they seem to be useful here.

EDIT: hotvette, you posted just as I was writing out my post :)
 
can you please post the other two equations because I am just lost trying to set up the problem. Once have the other two equations i would be able to solve it myself. Thanks for your help
 

Thread 'Family of lines that are at a distance of 5 from the origin'

I picked up this problem from the Schaum's series book titled "College Mathematics" by Ayres/Schmidt. It is a solved problem in the book. But what surprised me was that the solution to this problem was given in one line without any explanation. I could, therefore, not understand how the given one-line solution was reached. The one-line solution in the book says: The equation is ##x \cos{\omega} +y \sin{\omega} - 5 = 0##, ##\omega## being the parameter. From my side, the only thing I could...
View full post »

Hot Threads

Recent Insights

Back
Top