Apr 27
Dollars And Cents
Someone at work posed a riddle to me and I thought I’d share it with everyone:
Three women go to a motel. The manager charges them $30, so they each pay $10. Then the manager realized that there was a special on the room and it was really just $25. He sent the bellboy the $5 back to them. They decided that since $5 does not divide evenly 3 ways, they would get $1 back each, bringing their cost down to $9, and the bellboy could keep $2 as a tip. However, that total is $29 (3 x $9 + 2), so where did the remaining dollar go?
The answer will be in the first comment.
1 Comment so far
Leave a comment
Work the problem in reverse. None of the money disappears.
The hotel costs $25 (not $30), which costs them each $8.33 (approx). The bellboy’s tip cost them $0.66 each, which brings their individual totals to approximately $9. When they get the dollar back, that’s $10, which is $30 total again.
The key is that you can’t think about it from the perspective of the original payment, but what the room actually costs.
Fun little riddle that hopefully didn’t take you longer than a few minutes to figure out.