The Student Room Group
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>
Uni students - Complete our survey >>

Is there a formula for this?

Say that there was a report that went 'Apple's profits were 8% lower this year than they were last year'.... is there a formula that you can use to work out the exact figure of Apple's profits last year? Assume that the figure this year is £500,000 (not representative of Apple's performance i know but that doesn't matter), could you find the figure for last year if you just knew that there was a 8% decrease?

I vaguely recall doing something like this in GCSE and i asked my mate about it but he seems to think that there's no way to get an exactly accurate answer and now i'm confused. Any help would be appreciated.
Reply 1
Avatar for aznkid66
aznkid66
1
Formula? Just logic it..

The base year is last year = 100%.

This year is 8% lower than last year = 92%.

Thus, given this year is 500000, last year is 500000/.92 = 543478.26...
Reply 2
Avatar for ztibor
ztibor
10
Original post by theonefrombrum
Say that there was a report that went 'Apple's profits were 8% lower this year than they were last year'.... is there a formula that you can use to work out the exact figure of Apple's profits last year? Assume that the figure this year is £500,000 (not representative of Apple's performance i know but that doesn't matter), could you find the figure for last year if you just knew that there was a 8% decrease?

I vaguely recall doing something like this in GCSE and i asked my mate about it but he seems to think that there's no way to get an exactly accurate answer and now i'm confused. Any help would be appreciated.


If the profits 8% lower then they were last year will mean the last-year profits
were the 100% and now they are 92%.
Knowing the figute this year (500,000) you can find it for last year as follows
500000(100−8)⋅100=5000000.92\frac{500000}{(100-8)}\cdot 100=\frac{500000}{0.92}
(edited 11 years ago)
Original post by aznkid66
Formula? Just logic it..

The base year is last year = 100%.

This year is 8% lower than last year = 92%.

Thus, given this year is 500000, last year is 500000/.92 = 543478.26...

Thanks a lot :smile:

Original post by ztibor
If the profits 8% lower then they were last year will mean the last-year profits
were the 100% and now they are 92%.
Knowing the figute this year (500,000) you can find it for last year as follows
500000(100−8)⋅100=5000000.92\frac{500000}{(100-8)}\cdot 100=\frac{500000}{0.92}

Quick Reply

Related discussions

Latest

Trending

Trending

Articles for you