A large pharmaceutical company uses the function f(x)=1.579x - 2967 to model the amount of money, in billions of dollars, it spends each year on research and development, where x corresponds to the year. Use the function to predict the amount of money it will spend in 2017
To predict the amount of money the company will spend in 2017, we need to substitute x = 2017 into the function f(x) = 1.579x - 2967:
f(2017) = 1.579(2017) - 2967
= 3181.843 - 2967
= 214.843
Therefore, the company is predicted to spend approximately $214.843 billion in 2017.