It’s a Piece of Cake….Pie
Circle graphs are also known as pie charts or pie graphs. One look and you can see why. Each piece of data resembles a slice of pie. Each slice represents a percentage. The circle graph always adds up to 100%.
Liesel’s Budget
Liesel earns $3,000 a month working as a purchasing manager. Below is a circle graph showing Liesel’s budget. Each slice shows the percentage spent in a particular area.
On the exam, you might be asked a question like how much money is spent on utilities monthly? To answer that, multiply Liesel’s total monthly budget ($3,000) by the percent represented on the graph. The utilities are 20% so $3,000 x .20 = $600. Liesel budgets $600 monthly for utilities.
When you calculate out the percentages to the actual amount of each item, the sum of those amounts will add up to the original total. If not, then you have calculated one or more of the percentages wrong.