[X4U] Is the topic of how calculators do percentages worth 87 posts to this list?

[Art]

On Nov 28, 2005, at 10:18 PM, Brett Conlon wrote:

> It's hard to teach old dogs new tricks.... good thing we're not  
> working with dogs!   ;-D
>
> Coj
>
> Eddie Hargreaves <meged at earthlink.net>
>
> <snipped>
>
> In fact, just today I had an advertising contact call me up and  
> said I could
> take 15% off a certain rate. Normally, I would type the number,  
> subtract
> 15%, which is the way I've been doing it for years. With the new Tiger
> calculator, I would have to change my thought to creating a proper
> mathematical written equation of the number * .85
>
> <snipped>
>
> Eddie Hargreaves

Eddie's <snipped> account reminded me of a situation that occurred  
_many_ years ago when I tried to buy an item at a store that  
advertised 15% off. The young sales clerk, despite repeated trials on  
her calculator, wasn't able to enter the reduction correctly, and  
they were quite busy so she couldn't get an associate to help. After  
a considerable length of time and a great deal of frustration, I  
tried to help by suggesting that she just multiply the pre-sale price  
by 85%. She paused, looked at me suspiciously and said, "Oh, no; we  
can't do it that way." (True story!)