Q:

The cost to mail a letter is a base charge of $0.42 plus $0.17 for each ounce. Write an expression to represent the cost for mailing a letter that is w ounces. Then find the cost for mailing a letter that is four ounces. 0.17 + 0.42w; $1.85 0.42 + 0.17w; $1.10 0.17 + 0.42w; $2.36 0.42 + 0.17w; $2.36

Accepted Solution

A:
Answer:The total cost of mailing a letter is expressed by: [tex]0.42+(0.17w)[/tex]The cost for mailing a four-ounce letter is: $1.10Step-by-step explanation:First, you have a fixed cost, independent of any other variable, which is [tex]0.42[/tex].Then you have a cost that is dependent on the weight, expressed in ounces, which is [tex]0.17[/tex] per ounce. This means that if you had [tex]2[/tex] ounces, then your cost would be duplicated, becoming [tex]0.34[/tex], and so on and so forth. Let's define the weight as [tex]w[/tex].The total cost of mailing a letter equals the base charge (or the fixed cost) plus the cost of the number of ounces that our letter weighs. We can express this statement in mathematical terms:[tex]0.42+(0.17*w)=COST[/tex]Now, we want to know how much it would cost us to mail a letter that weighs [tex]4[/tex] ounces. That means we know the value of the [tex]w[/tex] in our expression, so we can substitute it and solve the expression:[tex]0.42+(0.17*4)=COST[/tex][tex]0.42+0.68=COST[/tex][tex]1.1=COST[/tex]It would cost us $1.10 to send a 4 ounce letter.