Worksheet - Probability, RV and Prob Distributions
Worksheet - Probability, RV and Prob Distributions
a. What is the probability that a respondent 18–29 years of age thinks that global warming
will not pose a serious threat during his/her lifetime?
b. What is the probability that a respondent 30+ years of age thinks that global warming will
not pose a serious threat during his/her lifetime?
c. For a randomly selected respondent, what is the probability that a respondent answer
yes?
d. Based on the survey results, does there appear to be a difference between ages 18–29
and 30+ regarding concern over global warming?
3. Information about mutual funds provided by Morningstar includes the type of mutual fund
(Domestic Equity, International Equity, or Fixed Income) and the Morningstar rating for the
fund. The rating is expressed from 1-star (lowest rating) to 5-star (highest rating). Suppose a
sample of 25 mutual funds provided the following counts:
Assume that one of these 25 mutual funds will be randomly selected in order to learn more
about the mutual fund and its investment strategy.
a. What is the probability of selecting a Domestic Equity fund?
b. What is the probability of selecting a fund with a 4-star or 5-star rating?
c. What is the probability of selecting a fund that is both a Domestic Equity fund and a fund
with a 4-star or 5-star rating?
d. What is the probability of selecting a fund that is a Domestic Equity fund or a fund with a
4-star or 5-star rating?
4. The Bureau of Transportation Statistics reports on-time performance for airlines at major
Indian airports. Suppose that the percentage of on-time flights reported was 76.8% for
Indigo, 71.5% for Air India, and 82.2% for Vistara. Assume that 35% of the flights arriving at
Terminal 1 of Delhi airport are Indigo flights, 45% are Air India flights, and 20% are Vistara
flights.
a. Develop a joint probability table with three rows (the airlines) and two columns (on-time
and late).
b. An announcement is made that Flight 1382 will be arriving at gate 20 of terminal 1. What
is the probability that Flight 1382 will arrive on time?
c. What is the most likely airline for Flight 1382? What is the probability that Flight 1382 is by
this airline?
d. Suppose that an announcement is made saying that Flight 1382 will now be arriving late.
What is the most likely airline for this flight? What is the probability that Flight 1382 is by
this airline?
5. To better understand how husbands and wives feel about their finances, Money magazine
conducted a national poll of 1010 married adults age 25 and older with monthly household
incomes of Rs 100000 or more. Consider the following example set of responses to the
question, “Who is better at getting deals?”
Who is Better? Respondent
Husband Wife
I am 278 290
My Spouse 127 111
We are equal 102 102
a. Construct the probabilities for Who Is Better (I Am, My Spouse, We Are Equal). Comment.
b. Given that the respondent is a husband, what is the probability that he feels he is better
at getting deals than his wife?
c. Given that the respondent is a wife, what is the probability that she feels she is better at
getting deals than her husband?
d. Given a response “My spouse” is better at getting deals, what is the probability that the
response came from a husband?
e. Given a response “We are equal,” what is the probability that the response came from a
husband? What is the probability that the response came from a wife?
6. The following probability distributions of job satisfaction scores for a sample of information
systems (IS) senior executives and middle managers range from a low of 1 (very dissatisfied)
to a high of 5 (very satisfied).
Job Satisfaction Score Probability
IS Senior Executives IS Middle Managers
1 0.05 0.04
2 0.09 0.1
3 0.03 0.12
4 0.42 0.46
5 0.41 0.28
a. What is the expected value of the job satisfaction score for senior executives?
b. What is the expected value of the job satisfaction score for middle managers?
c. Compute the variance of job satisfaction scores for executives and middle managers.
d. Compute the standard deviation of job satisfaction scores for both probability
distributions.
8. Tracked Emails: According to a 2017 Wired magazine article, 40% of emails that are received
are tracked using software that can tell the email sender when, where, and on what type of
device the email was opened (Wired magazine website). Suppose we randomly select 40
received emails.
a. What is the expected number of these emails that are tracked?
b. What are the variance and standard deviation for the number of these emails that are
tracked?
9. Large-Cap Domestic Stock Fund: The average return for large-cap domestic stock funds over
the three years was 14.4%. Assume the three-year returns were normally distributed across
funds with a standard deviation of 4.4%.
a. What is the probability an individual large-cap domestic stock fund had a three-year
return of at least 20%?
b. What is the probability an individual large-cap domestic stock fund had a three-year
return of 10% or less?
c. How big does the return have to be to put a domestic stock fund in the top 10% for the
three-year period?
10. Automobile Repair Costs: Automobile repair costs continue to rise with an average 2015
cost of Rs. 4670 per repair. Assume that the cost for an automobile repair is normally
distributed with a standard deviation of Rs. 880. Answer the following questions about the
cost of automobile repairs.
a. What is the probability that the cost will be more than Rs 4500?
b. What is the probability that the cost will be less than Rs 2500?
c. What is the probability that the cost will be between Rs. 2500 and Rs 4500?
d. If the cost for your car repair is in the lower 5% of automobile repair charges, what is your
cost?
11. Die Another Day hospital Nursing Staff: At Die Another Day (DAD) hospital, nurses are
given an additional bonus of Rs. 1,00,000 if they stay for more than 32 months with DAD
hospital. The stay of nurses has an average of 28 months with a standard deviation of 4
months. With suitable assumptions, calculate
(a) The expected number of nurses who will be given bonus and the value of bonus that will
be given if 50 new nurses join DAD hospital in the current month.
(b) How much amount will be saved by DAD hospital if DAD hospital changes the policy
that they will give bonus if the stay exceeds 36 months?
(c) What will be the additional amount paid if DAD hospital changes the policy that they will
give bonus if the stay exceeds 24 months? What assumptions are made in this case?
(d) Is normal assumption required to find the approximate probabilities? What method can be
used to check your assumption?
12. Local Dhania, the online grocery store makes a promise that it will deliver the order within 92
minutes. Based on the past data, it was found that the delivery time is approximately normal
with the average time taken to deliver being 80 minutes with a standard deviation of 12.
(a) What proportion of orders is delivered after 92 minutes?
(b) If Local Dhania would like to ensure that at least 99.85% of the orders are delivered
before 90 minutes, what should be the target mean delivery time? Due to delivery and
package constraints, assume no change in the standard deviation in the delivery of the
order.
(c) If it is not possible to reduce the mean time to deliver and its standard deviation, what
should be the promised time to deliver for which the probability of delivery before that
time is 99.85%.
13. Consider the data on the trade deficit given in Nation.xlsx. Check whether the data is
normally distributed.