y-intercept

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y-intercept

by grandh01 » Thu Sep 27, 2012 10:49 am
In the xy-plane, what is the y-intercept of line l ?
(1) The x-intercept of line l is 3/2.
(2) Line l is perpendicular to line k, which has a slope of -2.

oa is C
Source: — Data Sufficiency |

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by Ian Stewart » Thu Sep 27, 2012 12:54 pm
grandh01 wrote:In the xy-plane, what is the y-intercept of line l ?
(1) The x-intercept of line l is 3/2.
(2) Line l is perpendicular to line k, which has a slope of -2.

oa is C
Lots of lines have an x-intercept at 3/2, so Statement 1 is not sufficient.

Perpendicular lines have slopes which are negative reciprocals, so from Statement 2, we know line L has a slope of 1/2. Lots of lines have slopes of 1/2, so Statement 2 is not sufficient.

Using both statements, we know the slope of L and a point on L, so we can draw all of line L and therefore answer any question about it, so the two statements together are sufficient and the answer is C.
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