Question

If 5 men can cane 5 chairs in hours than 1 man shall cane 1 chair in how many hours.
(a) 1 hour
(b) 15 hours
(c) 5 hours
(d) 10 hours

Answer 1

Hint: In order to solve this problem, where we need to assume that canning is an individual process and it can be done simultaneously by many people. So even though $n$ men take 5 hours to cane $n$ chairs then 1 man will still take 5 hours to cane 1 chair.

Complete step by step answer:
We have given that there are 5 men who cane 5 chairs in 5 hours.
The time is taken by 5 men to cane 5 chairs = 5 hours.
If one man has to cane all the 5 chairs, then that man would take = 5 x 5 = 25 hours.
But we are asked to find the time taken for one man to cane one chair.
Therefore, if 1 man takes 25 hours to cane 5 chairs then, 1 man will take $\dfrac{25}{5}$ hours.
Solving, we get,
$\dfrac{25}{5}=5$ .

So, the correct answer is “Option c”.

Note: In this problem, it is easily mistaken that if 5 men will take 5 hours to cane 5 chairs, then 1 man will take 1 hour to cane 1 chair. But this is not the case, this mistake is done because we tend to divide all the numbers by 5. But, in general, even if $n$ men take 5 hours to cane $n$ chairs then 1 man will still take 5 hours to cane 1 chair.