To find the increase in the debt over the 50-year period, we need to subtract the debt in 1971 from the debt in 2021.
2021 debt - 1971 debt = ($2.9617 × 10¹³) - ($3.98 × 10¹¹) = $2.9617 × 10¹³ - $3.98 × 10¹¹
To subtract these values, we need to have the same exponent for the powers of 10. To do this, we can convert $2.9617 × 10¹³ to scientific notation with the same exponent as $3.98 × 10¹¹, which is $0.29817 × 10¹⁴.
Now we can subtract:
$0.29817 × 10¹⁴ - $3.98 × 10¹¹ = $0.29817 × 10¹⁴ - $0.398 × 10¹⁴ = $0.29817 × 10¹⁴ - $0.39817 × 10¹⁴ = $0.1 × 10¹⁴
Therefore, the increase in the debt over the 50-year period is $0.1 × 10¹⁴, which can be written in scientific notation as $1.0 × 10¹³.
So the answer is $1.0 × 10¹³, which is equivalent to $1.0183 × 10¹³ in scientific notation.
The US national debt was $2.9617 × 10¹³ in 2021 and $3.98 × 10¹¹ in 1971. Find how much the debt increased in the 50-year period. Choose an answer from below:
$2.9219 × 10¹¹
$2.9219 × 10¹³
$1.0183 × 10²⁴
$3.0015 × 10¹³
1 answer
1 answer