a local government had an employee reduction and lost 1/9 of their employees. If 176 of its employees were left after the reduction how many employees were there originally?
(8/9)x = 176
x = 176 / (8/9)
x = 176 * (9/8)
x = 1,584 / 8
x = 198
Thank you! I was having a mental block with this...
You're welcome.
To find the number of employees originally, we can use the fact that the local government lost 1/9 of its employees and ended up with 176 employees.
Let's assume the original number of employees as "x".
According to the problem, the local government lost 1/9 of its employees, which means that 1/9 of the original number of employees equals the number of employees lost.
The number of employees lost is: (1/9) * x
After the reduction, the local government has 176 employees. So, the number of employees left is: x - (1/9) * x.
Given that the number of employees left is 176, we can set up the equation:
x - (1/9) * x = 176
Now, we can simplify the equation and solve for x:
(8/9) * x = 176
Divide both sides by (8/9) to isolate x:
x = 176 * (9/8)
Calculate the value of x:
x = 198
Therefore, the local government originally had 198 employees.