Official Explanation
Step 1: Understand the Prompt and Question
This is a line chart. The first set of answers requires you only to be able to tell whether one thing is greater than, less than, or equal to something else; there’s a good chance you’ll be able to eyeball this. The second blank requires a real value, but the answer choices are far enough apart that you’ll likely be able to estimate.
Also note that the answers for the second blank seem way too big compared to the y-axis given in the graph. The graph is in thousands as shown by the y axis label. The answers show the real number, not the abbreviated numbers shown on the graph.
Use that as your segue into the chart itself. It shows monthly revenues in thousands of dollars during 2013 for two different companies. For example, a point at 2,000 indicates revenues of $2,000,000, or $2 million.
This is a line graph, so you may need to determine differences between points on the line. That’s easiest to do by counting segments of the graph, so figure out what each horizontal line segment represents and jot down that figure. In this case, each segment represents 200, or $200,000.
In some months, Company A earned higher revenues; in other months, Company B did. Interestingly, Company B started higher and finished higher, while A jumped above B only in the middle of the year.
The two parts of the question ask for related information: which company had higher annual revenues and what that difference was. When this is the case, think about how to save yourself some time and effort by solving the statements simultaneously.
Step 2: Plan Your Approach
The first part asks whether Company A’s revenues were greater, less than, or equal to Company B’s, so plan to track the difference in terms of Company A.
The standard math way to solve would be to mark down every monthly figure and add them all up for both companies, then compare the two figures. That involves adding 24 numbers, though—way too much work! There has to be an easier way.
There is! Count only the differences between the figures. Further, use the segments to make your calculations easier. Count just by segments, then multiply by 200 (the value of one segment) to convert to the actual figure.
Finally, don’t worry about the thousands of dollars part of things for now; solve using the y-axis scale and add in three zeros later.
Step 3: Solve the Problem
First, just eyeball the graph. For the first five months, Company A is significantly below Company B, enough to create quite a large negative differential. Company B does lose some ground in the middle of the chart, but not enough to offset the initial differential, especially considering that Company B rebounds at the end of the year.
So Company A should end up lower than Company B. You’ll have to calculate more precisely to know how much, but expect the answer to the
first blank to be less than.
In January, Company A is about two segments below Company B. For this month, the differential is −2. The February differential is −1.5, so the total differential is now −3.5. Continue counting:
Company A finishes the year with −6 segments, which translates to a total of (−6) × (200) = −1,200 below Company B. Add in three zeros, and Company A’s revenue is $1,200,000 below Company B’s.
Thus, in 2013, Company A’s annual revenues were \(<\) Company B’s annual revenues, and the positive difference between the two figures was 1,250,000 approximately .