Taxing Your Monetary Skills
Three men were on a business trip and had to stay in a hotel over night. The price of the room was $30.00, so the men decided to split one room, three ways. Each one paid $10.00. Well, after they paid, the manager realized that he overcharged them on their room. The room only cost $25.00, so he gave the bellboy five one dollar bills to give to the three men. On his way up to the room the bell boy was trying to think of a way to split $5.00 three ways. After thinking about it awhile, he decided to keep $2.00 for himself and give each man $1.00 back. Now, if each man (who paid $10.00) gets $1.00 back that means they each paid $9.00 ($10.00 – $1.00 = $9 ). $9.00 multiplied by three (because there are three men) equals $27.00 plus the $2.00 the bell boy kept equals $29.00! What happened to the missing dollar?
Communicated by Bob Fischer.
If answers are posted, people often just read the solutions and lose the fun of trying. If you are stuck, you can email me for hints and then if you’re still a solution. [email protected]
Email me at [email protected]
One of your comments stated that there was a password for the Teacher site? I would love to use these for my algebra class, but I don’t want to use them unless I have the answers for sure! Thanks!
you can email me: [email protected]
if I post the answers people would often just look at the answers and not
try to solve them as hard on their own, and there is a tremendous value to
such efforts.
Why don’t your riddles have answers? How will I know if I’m correct?
Glad to hear!
Sending these to granddaughter at camp to stimulate her math oriented brain.
Puzzle one day and answer 2 days later.
Thank you
glad you’re enjoying .s
there’s a better answer…. email me at sjm1 AT williams.edu for a hint //s
wait isn’t the answer “there is no answer! haha you added wrong!”?
xiaomilk: yes — you can email me at SJM1 AT WILLIAMS.EDU to discuss solns.
I try to keep the solns from the comments and have them more as a discussion of what looks like a good idea but has a fundamental flaw. thus the comments often have hints, but shouldn’t have the soln (I’ll always email solns if needed). //s
btw, doesn’t your warning say the solutions are in the comments. why do you delete them. I look at the comments when I want an answer
J-crew: correct, well done; not posting as it’s the soln.
you’re very close, but not quite right. no one ‘purposefully’ left a tip….
ok, fixed.
Todd: Loved your response. I’m not posting the end of it as it’s the soln, but will post the rest:
Here is another way to ‘find’ the ‘missing’ dollar.
Two of these men return to the hotel a month later and again pay $30 for the room – $15 each. Again the manager realizes he made a mistake, the room is only $25, and sends the bellboy back to the room with 5 $1 bills. The bellboy decides to keep $3 and gives each man $1. Now each man paid $14 for a total of $28 and the bellboy has $3. $28 and $3 is $31! We just found the missing dollar! Hope you like this one although it is not the solution. The solution is really that [deleted by moderator]
left the wrong email address in my previous post. it had a 2 instead of @.
Nope — the issue is the problem tries to make you look at things the wrong way…. Email me at [email protected] if you want another hint or the soln
The missing dollar is embedded in the 9 dollars each contributed. Each should have contributed 8.33 not 9. 8,33*3=25
It’s trying to get you to combine things incorrectly — you’re on the right track, email me at [email protected] if you want the soln.
whats the answer? I super confused . I think theres no missing dollar since there were three dollars left . and he gave the buisness men 1 dollar each …. just the wrong math operation i guess.
To whomever Submitted on 2011/08/18 at 6:05 pm: correct! Not posting as it’s the soln.
To whomever posted at 5:29pm: correct, well done! As your post has the soln, I’m not displaying it.