Noella read that women used to make 75 cents for every dollar that men made. She says that this means that men were paid 25% more than women. Is she correct?
No.
1.25 * 0.75 = 0.94
No, Noella is not correct. Saying that women make 75 cents for every dollar that men make does not mean that men are paid 25% more than women.
To understand why this is incorrect, let's break it down:
If women make 75 cents for every dollar that men make, it means that women earn 75% of what men earn. In other words, women's earnings are 75% of men's earnings.
To find the percentage by which men earn more than women, we need to calculate the difference between what men earn and what women earn as a percentage of women's earnings. In this case, the difference between what men earn (100%) and what women earn (75%) is 25 percentage points.
To calculate the percentage by which men earn more than women, we divide the difference (25) by women's earnings (75) and multiply by 100: (25/75) * 100 = 33.3%.
Therefore, men are paid 33.3% more than women, not 25% as Noella suggested.
It is important to pay attention to the details and how percentages are calculated in order to understand the true meaning behind the statistics.