The population of Canada, as determined by the Canadian census, was as follows:
year 1996 2001 2006 2011 2016
population (in millions) 28.8 30.0 31.6 33.5 35.2
Let t denote the time measured in years from 1996.
(a) Suppose that population of Canada (measure in millions) is modeled by the linear function pl(t) = a+bt. Find the least-squares estimates for the parameters a and b.
(b) Suppose that the population of Canada (measure in millions) is modeled by the exponential function pe(t) = ceλ t. Linearize the model and use the least-squares method to estimate the parameters c and λ .