A company has 104 employees, and each employee is either a man or

Question

A company has 104 employees, and each employee is either a man or a woman. Are more than 60 percent of the employees women?

(1) 5/8 of the employees of the company are married women.
(2) If the company hired 36 men, then 45 percent of the employees would be men.

Edskore · Answer

This is a classic Data Sufficiency question that tests your ability to translate percentages into concrete numbers—and recognize when those numbers give you the answer.

**Understanding the question:** We have 104 employees total. We need to know if women > 60% of 104, which means women > 62.4, so at least 63 women.

**Statement 1: 5/8 of the employees are married women.**

Let's calculate: (5/8) × 104 = 65 married women.

Here's the key insight: this tells us there are AT LEAST 65 women in the company (the married ones alone). Since 65 > 63, we know for certain that more than 60% are women. **Sufficient.**

**Statement 2: If they hired 36 men, then 45% would be men.**

Setting up the equation: If we add 36 men, the new total is 104 + 36 = 140 employees.
At that point, men = 45% of 140 = 63.

So currently, men = 63 - 36 = 27.
This means women = 104 - 27 = 77.

Since 77 > 63, yes, more than 60% are women. **Sufficient.**

**Answer: D (each statement alone is sufficient)**

**Common trap:** Students often get stuck trying to separate married vs. unmarried women in Statement 1, but that's unnecessary. The moment you know there are 65 married women, you automatically know the total number of women must be at least 65.

**Takeaway:** In Data Sufficiency percentage problems, translate percentages to actual numbers early—it often reveals sufficiency faster than working with fractions.

kevincan · Answer

This is technically correct , but how would one reason their way to answer without these calculations ? If you use AI for explanations , insist on logic rather than brute force

kevincan · Answer

(1) if 5/8 of the employees are married women, we can say that at least 62.5% of the people are women. Sufficient.

(2) allows us to write the following equation: M +36= 45% of 140, where M is the number of employees who are men.

Since this equation has one solution , we can figure out exactly how many of the 104 employees are women . 
Clearly, we will then be able to calculate what percent of the employees are women and thus answer the question with certainty. Don’t waste time on calculations !

A company has 104 employees, and each employee is either a man or

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GMAT Data Sufficiency (DS) Questions

A company has 104 employees, and each employee is either a man or

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