Chapter 2: Back to Basics
Outline of Chapter Topics
Where can you go in life and not be exposed to numbers and mathematics? Whether you are figuring out the price of a product (including shipping) on eBay, or balancing your bank accounts, you use your elementary mathematical skills from both your primary and secondary education.
Think about the math you perform every day:
- At the grocery store, you compare products to calculate the best value. One brand of potato chips retails for [latex]\$3.99[/latex] for [latex]300[/latex] g, while the equally satisfying brand beside it is priced at [latex]\$3.49[/latex] for [latex]250[/latex] g. Which offers the better value?
- As the host for a large gathering, you are preparing a homemade lasagna and need to triple the original recipe, which calls for [latex]1\frac{2}{3}[/latex] cups of tomato sauce. In the expanded recipe, how many cups of tomato sauce do you need?
- Many employers pay out bonuses. Perhaps in your company managers get twice as large a bonus as employees. Your company has five managers and [latex]25[/latex] employees. If it announces a [latex]\$35,000[/latex] total bonus, what is your share as an employee?
Mathematics and numbers surround you in the business world, where you must read many numerical reports, interpret how the numbers fit together, and create your own reports showing such metrics as sales and profit projections.
Away from work, you must manage your income and pay your bills. This is a mathematical problem you likely solve on a daily basis, ensuring that the money flowing out of your bank account does not exceed the money flowing in. To purchase groceries, vacations, or entertainment, you need numbers.
This chapter gives you a refresher on your basic mathematical skills, which are essential for success in later chapters.
Attribution
“Chapter 2: Back to the Basics” from Business Math: A Step-by-Step Handbook (2021B) by J. Olivier and Lyryx Learning Inc. through a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License unless otherwise noted.
