Question

the ratio of blue pens to red pens is 8 to 15. If there are 461339 pens in the box, how many pens are red

Answer 1

According to the problem, the ratio is 8 to 15, that is, for every 8 blue pens, there are 15 red pens.

If we call x red pens, then we can express the following

$\frac{461,339-x}{x}=\frac{15}{8}$

We solve for x.

$8(461,339-x)=15x$$\begin{gathered} 3,690,712-8x=15x \\ 3,690,712=15x+8x \\ 23x=3,690,712 \\ x=\frac{3,690,712}{23}=160,465.7 \end{gathered}$

Therefore, there are 160,465 red pens.