Question

On two investments totaling $9,500, Peter lost 3 % on one and earned 7 % on the other. If his net annual receipts were $169, howmuch was each investment?Step 1 of 2: Use the variables x and y to set up a system of equations to solve the given problem.

Answer 1

Let's use the variable x to represent the first investment and y to represent the second investment.

If the total is $9500, we can write our first equation:

$x+y=9500$

Then, if he lost 3% on the first one and earned 7% on the other, and the result is an earning of $169, we can write our second equation:

$-0.03x+0.07y=169$

So the system of equations is:

$\begin{cases}x+y=9500 \\ -0.03x+0.07y=169\end{cases}$