A county commissioner must vote on a resolution that would commit substantial resources to the construction of a sewer in an out
lying residential area. Her fiscal decisions have been criticized in the past, so she decides to take a survey of residents in her district to find out whether they favor spending money for a sewer system. She will vote to appropriate funds only if she can be reasonably sure that a majority of the people in her district favor the measure. What hypotheses should she test?
This is a hypothesis testing involving population proportion. The null hypothesis would be that fewer than or 50% of the people would favor spending money for a sewer system. Since she will vote to appropriate funds only if she can be reasonably sure that a majority of the people in her district favor the measure, then the alternative hypothesis which she should test is that more than 50% of the people would favor spending money for a sewer system.
