Gina cut a piece of ribbon into 3 equal pieces. Then she cut 2 inches off one piece to make a piece 3 inches long. How long was Gina's original piece of ribbon?

Answer 1

let the original piece be 3x
after 1st cut, each piece is x inches long
2 inches off one of those pieces leaves x-2

but x-2 = 3
x = 5

So the original length was 15 inches