Assignment task: Here are the weekly wages in a sample of 10 wage and salary workers: 150, 250, 350, 400, 450, 550, 650, 800 , and 1,000.
In small samples like this one, the gaps between the wages are a source of ambiguity in computing wages at percentiles of the distribution. Let's resolve the median id halfway between the highest values in the bottom half of the sample and the lowest value in the top half of the sample. Also, 30 percent of the workers earn $300 or less, but 30 percent also earn $349.99 or less. To be consistent with the calculation of the median wage, the wage at 30th percentile is halfway between $300 and $350.
1. Compute the mean and media of wages in this sample.
2. What are the wages at the 10th and 90th percentiles in this sample?
3. What is the 90 - 10 percentile ratio? That is, the worker at the 90th percentile earns________ times as much as the worker at the 10th percentile.
4. How far from the median wage are the wages at the 1oth and 90th percentiles? Do wages in this small sample skew to the right?