The population of a city decreases by 5% per year. What should we multiply the current population by to find next year's population in one step?

1 answer

To determine what to multiply the current population by to find next year's population after a 5% decrease, we can start by considering what a 5% decrease means in terms of the remaining population.

If the population decreases by 5%, this means that 95% of the current population will remain. To express this as a multiplication factor, you can convert the percentage to a decimal:

  1. Find 5% in decimal: \[ 5% = 0.05 \]

  2. Subtract this value from 1 to find the remaining percentage: \[ 1 - 0.05 = 0.95 \]

Therefore, to find next year's population given the current population, you should multiply the current population by 0.95.

In summary, to find next year's population, multiply the current population by 0.95.