Real-Life Math
You're a court clerk. In addition to performing duties
in the courtroom, you also handle some accounting and dispensing of fines,
fees and trust monies. You also calculate costs that have been assessed by
the court.
"We use very little math on the job," says Jackie Meisenheimer.
She is a court clerk. "More math is used by clerks in the financial areas.
"But
we do have to use day-to-day math skills such as multiplication and division.
We need this to figure out percentages of bail or fines and fees."
Every
court case has costs involved. The side that loses generally pays these expenses.
Depending on the type of case, a differing portion of the entire cost of the
case is assessed.
To figure out how much a person has to pay, a scale
of cost is used. The scale rating applied to each case is from 1 to 5. The
simple cases are assessed at level 1. Very complex and lengthy cases (such
as one that ends up at the Supreme Court) may be assessed at a level 5.
Each
of these levels denotes a certain portion of cost that the loser in the trial
has to pay:
- Level 1: Person has to pay a quarter of the total cost of the case
- Level 2: Person has to pay a third of the total cost of the case
- Level 3: Person has to pay half of the total cost of the case
- Level 4: Person has to pay three-quarters of the total cost of the case
- Level 5: Person has to pay the entire cost of the case
Two cases sit on your desk, waiting for the costs to be assessed.
Questions:
- Case A cost $80,000 and has been assessed at level 3. What amount does
the person have to pay?
- Case B cost $35,000 and has been assessed at level 1. What amount does
the person have to pay?