In: Economics
You have an economics test in two weeks. It will cover both micro- and macroeconomics. Each part will be worth 50 points. You have a total of 100 hours that you can spend studying for this exam. For the first 15.0 hours you spend studying microeconomics, you will get one point more for each additional hour of studying. After that, you will get one point more for each three hours you spend studying, up to the maximum possible of 50 points. Macroeconomics is different. For your first 20.0 hours of studying you will get one point for each 45 minutes you spend studying. After that, you will get one point for each 1.5 hours you spend up to the maximum of 50 points. How many hours in total should you spend studying macroeconomics? No units, no rounding.
The highest points is received for studying first 20 hours macroeconomics, which is for each point we need to study 45 minutes.
After that, the next highest number of points are received for the first 15 hours of studying microeconomics.
Then, for additional hour of studying macroeconomics , we get 1 point for every 1.5 hours and for every additional hour of studying microeconomics, we get 1 point for every 3 hours.
So in order to maximise the total points, we will study in the pattern in which we get the highest points.
So firstly we will study 19.5 hours of macroeconomics and get 26 points in macroeconomics.
Then we will study 15 hours of microeconomics and get 15 points in microeconomics.
After that we will study macroeconomics as long as we do not get a total of 50 points in macroeconomics. This is because we are getting higher number of points for studying additional hour of macroeconomics as compared to studying additional hour of microeconomics. So in order to get the remaining 24 points in macroeconomics, we will need to study 24*1.5 = 36 hours of macroeconomics.
The remainig time after studying all these will be 100-15-19.5-36 = 29.5 hours, which will be used in studying microeconomics.
So total time spent in studying microeconomics is 19.5+36 = 55.5 hours.