Answer:
Step-by-step explanation:
First of all, to keep our numbers manageable, we are going to let year 2001 = 0 so year 2012 = 11. The coordinates that result from these years/population numbers are (0, 22200) and (11, 13950). Since this linear, we can plug those 2 coordinate pairs into the slope equation to find the rate at which the population is decreasing in people per year:
That means that the town is losing people at the rate of 750 per year. We can use that slop along with one of the coordinate points to write the linear equation representing this situation:
and
y = -750x + 22200. That answers part A.
Now for B we need to find y when x = 13 (remember we let year 2001 = 0, so year 2014 = 13):
y = -750(13) + 22200 so
y = 12450 people in the year 2014