DS from Gmat prep

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DS from Gmat prep

by willymtz » Wed May 02, 2007 9:42 am
How to solve:

Pat bought 5 pounds of apples. How many pounds of pears could Pat have bought for the same amount of money?
(1) One pound of pears costs $0.50 more than one pounds of apples.
(2) One pound of peras costs 1.5 times as much as one pound of apples.

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by gm800 » Wed May 02, 2007 2:21 pm
Is the answer B?

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by willymtz » Wed May 02, 2007 2:55 pm
Yes it is, how did you solve it?

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by gm800 » Wed May 02, 2007 4:18 pm
Lets say that the cost of each apple was x.

The total cost of apples = 5*x.

According to Statement (1) one pound of Pears costs 0.50c more than apples. Lets say the same amount of money can buy p pears.

5*x = p*(x+0.5)

there is insufficient information here to solve this.

According to statement (2), the pear costs 1.5 times as much as the apples per pound. This means you can buy 1.5 times less number of pears than you can buy apples. Since you know the money can buy 5 apples, this will always give you an answer.

So the choice is B.