Sam buys a new pair of shoes for $53.50 including tax. He lives in a state that has a 7% sales tax rate. What was the cost of the shoes BEFORE tax?

$49.75

Step-by-step explanation:

$53.50 is with the added 7%.

we want to find what the price is without the 7%

take that $53.50 is 100%

1% - 53.50/100 = 0.535

7% - 0.535 x 7 = 3.745

$53.50 - 3.75 = $49.75

I got the 76.430

Step-by-step explaination:

So first, what I did is how Sam even got 53.50

I came up with a expression like this- Let n express the amount of money before tax!

(n) times 0.7 would equal 53.50

All I did now, was just reverse the whole thing.

53.50 divided by 0.7 would equal (n)

When I did the question above, I got 76.4285714286, though if you round it to the nearest hundredth. Which was 76.430

Let me know, If you have more questions about how I got my answer.