Question

A store is having a summer sale where all prices are 25−30% off. If you want to buy a pair of shoes that costs $50.00, what could be the sale price for this pair of shoes? An 8% sales tax must be applied to the sale price. What would be the final cost of the pair of shoes, including the sales tax?

Answer 1

Before Tax: $37.50 and $32.50

After-Tax: $40.50 and $35.10

Explanation:

In order to calculate the sales price we need to turn these percentages into the proper decimals, since they are discounts we would do this by dividing each percentage by 100 and then subtracting them from 1. Then we use those decimals and multiply them by the original cost of the shoes.

25% / 100 = 0.25

1 - 0.25 = 0.75

50.00 * 0.75 = $37.50

30% / 100 = 0.35

1 - 0.35 = 0.65

50.00 * 0.65 = $32.50

Now we see that the sales price for these shoes would range between $37.50 and $32.50. Now we need to add an 8% sales tax, we do this by dividing this percentage by 100 and adding 1 to it. Then we multiply this new value by the new sales prices.

8% / 100 = 0.08

0.08 + 1 = 1.08

$37.50 * 1.08 = $40.50

$32.50 * 1.08 = $35.10