Yoric the worker came to a fair looking for a job.

There, Arley, an artisan, offered him the following terms:

"I wil pay you once every 67 days, one gold coin for a day of work, minus five coins for upkeep - a total of 62 coins in all!"

Suddenly a competing artisan named Bentley interrupted:

"Don't work for Arley, come work for me instead. I will also give you one coin a day, minus five for upkeep, but I will pay you every 57 days instead of 67. That's right, stick with me, and you'll get your 52 coins a whole ten days faster!"

Even though he wasn't very good at math, Yoric was a smart fellow and quickly figured out who was offering a better deal. Can you do it without using a calculator or performing complex fractional arithmetics?

If the problem was posed with another factor that the per day pay of Arley and Bentley are different the solution couldn't be that straightforward as given by Happy...

Posted by chakravarthi on 2002-12-29 05:48:02