tough and tricky questions : word problems . a salesman ' s income consists of commission and base salary . his weekly income totals over the past 5 weeks have been $ 406 , $ 413 , $ 420 , $ 436 and $ 395 . what must his average ( arithmetic mean ) income over the next 5 weeks be to increase his average weekly income to $ 500 over the 10 - week period ? Pick
A) $ 570 B) $ 586 C) $ 630 D) $ 686 E) $ 715

Rationale: official solution : ( b ) first , we need to add up the wages over the past 5 weeks : $ 406 + $ 413 + $ 420 + $ 436 + $ 395 = $ 2070 . to average $ 500 over 10 weeks , the salesman would need to earn : $ 500 × 10 = $ 5000 . subtract $ 2070 from $ 5000 to determine how much he would need to earn , in total , over the next 5 weeks to average $ 500 for the 10 weeks : $ 5000 – $ 2070 = $ 2930 . dividing $ 2930 by 5 will give us the amount he needs to earn on average over the next 5 weeks : $ 2930 / 5 = $ 586 . the correct answer is choice ( b ) .
Answer: B