Question

one pound of swordfish costs as much as 1.5 pounds of salmon. Mrs. O pays $39 for 2 pounds of salmon and 3 pounds of swordfish. Find the ratio of the amount of money Mrs. O pays for the swordfish to the amount of money she pays for the swordfish.

Answer 1

Answer with explanation:

It is given that:

one pound of swordfish costs as much as 1.5 pounds of salmon.

Let x be the cost of one pound of salmon.

This means that the cost of one pound of swordfish is: 1.5x

Mrs. O pays $39 for 2 pounds of salmon and 3 pounds of swordfish.

This means that:

$2x+3(1.5x)=39\\\\2x+4.5x=39\\\\6.5x=39\\\\x=\dfrac{39}{6.5}\\\\x=6$

This means that cost of 1 pound of salmon= $ 6

Hence, cost of 2 pounds of salmon= $ 12  ( since, 6×2=12 )

and cost of 1 pound of swordfish= $ (1.5×6)= $ 9

Hence,

cost of 3 pound of swordfish= $ (9×3)=$ 27

• Hence, ratio of amount of money she pays for salmon to the swordfish is:

                    12/27= 4/9

                         i.e.   4:9

• and the ratio of  amount of money she pays for swordfish to the salmon is:

                         9:4

Answer 2

For every 2 pounds of salmon she pays for she will get 3 pounds of sword fish with it. 2 to 3 or 2/3 are different ways to Write a ratio for this problem.