Question

Balloons-4-You charges a $4 initial fee and $3 per hour to rent a helium tank for parties. Party-Palace rents their helium tanks for $5 per hour with no initial fee. After how many hours, x, would the two companies charge the same amount, y, for a rental?

Answer 1

After 2 hours, both Balloons-4-You and Party-Palace would charge the same amount for a helium tank rental.

Step-by-step explanation:

The student is asking when two companies, Balloons-4-You and Party-Palace, would charge the same amount for a helium tank rental after a certain number of hours. To find this, we set up an equation where the cost of Balloons-4-You, which has a $4 initial fee plus $3 per hour, is equal to the cost of Party-Palace, which charges $5 per hour with no initial fee.

Let's denote the number of hours as x and the total cost charged as y. For Balloons-4-You, the equation is y = 4 + 3x. For Party-Palace, it is y = 5x. Setting these equations equal to each other gives us 4 + 3x = 5x. Solving for x yields x = 2. Therefore, after 2 hours, both companies will charge the same amount for renting a helium tank.