Comment on Percentages

pseudo@jlai.lu ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

• sem@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

  Maybe I’m wrong but by writing “increase by 80%” there is ambiguity you don’t get if you instead spelled out:

  1. Increase by 80 percent
  2. Increase by 80 percentage points

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  • pseudo@jlai.lu ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I’m not an expert either and your second option is definitly clearer than mine but I believe the % symbol doesn’t have the meaning of percentage point. It is better to make things easier for people to understand but people should also make the effort of properly reading even when it is not fully dumbed down. These are prepositions, so basic english not scientist jargon.

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    • Droggelbecher@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Im a high school maths teacher and that’s what we’re supposed to teach, % means percent, not percentage points. Maths always tries to have agreed-upon unambiguous definitions of things, precisely to avoid confusion.

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      • fallingcats@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Maths always tries to have agreed-upon unambiguous definitions of things, precisely to avoid confusion.

        Laughs in ambiguous notation

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• ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

  Or “by 80 percentage points”

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  • LovableSidekick@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    “By 80 percentage points” means add 80 more points to a percentage number, so 5% becomes 85%. “By 80 percent” means add 80 percent of the current value.

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    • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I know. By x % and by x percentage points is the most commonly confused pairs, not by x % and to x %.

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