Question

A `16 4/5 %` commission is earned for selling bikes. The sales price on a bike sold is $101.38. What's the commission earned?

Answer 1

If the commission is paid on the entire $101.38, $17.03. If the commission is included within the $101.38, $14.58.

Explanation:

I'm not entirely sure from the question if the commission is part of the sales price, so I'll do it both ways. Also, the sales price is an odd amount, which implies there might be sales taxes included in the sales price that probably won't be part of the commission paid:

Commission not part of sales price

We take the sales price and multiply by the commission percentage (note that with a commission of `16 4/5%`, we can use a decimal replacement for the `4/5=.8`:

`$101.38xx.168~=$17.03`

Commission part of the sales price

Within the price is the commission, and so we need to split out the commission. And so within the sale is 100% for the actual sales price and then another 16.8% for the commission, giving:

`101.38/(1+.168)~=$86.80` is the sale and `101.38-86.80=$14.58` is the commission.

Answer 2

So you earn a commission of `$17.03` for selling the bike

Explanation:

We need to calculate what `16 4/5%` of `101.38` is.

Before we get to far, I like to estimate my answer. That way I can have a "does this make sense" check at the end. So, `101.38` is about `100`, and `16 4/5` is about `15`. So that means `100 xx 0.15 = $15`

The first thing I'll do is convert `16 4/5` into one fraction.

Now we have `101.38 xx 84/5%`, which is `101.38 xx 84/5/100` or `101.38 xx 0.168`.This simplifies to `17.03`

So you earn a commission of `$17.03` for selling the bike