Taxes:

Taxes are the favorite topic among rich people. That is where you show your smartness. Richest people pay the least in taxes. so, if you want to save in taxes, your best bet is to get rich !!

All across the world, governments work for rich people. Actually rich people are the government. Governments print money, give it to rich people, rich people pass a tiny fraction of that to poor people, and government collects back whatever little this poor people got from rich people in form of taxes. Rich people are taxed very little, and even if they were taxed heavily, most of the money they make is anyway free money given to them by the government. So it's not like they are paying back their own earned money. Thanks to modern economics, it's good to be rich :)

When we talk about taxes, we are talking about Income taxes that you and I pay on our earnings. there are many other kind of taxes, as property taxes that we pay annually on our houses, sales tax that we pay on anything that we buy, etc.

Most of the countries of the world levy income taxes on any income that an individual makes in a given year. You are taxed only on realized income. As an ex, if you bought gold, and that appreciates in value every year, you won't be taxed on that appreciation. You will be taxed only when you sell it, and will be taxed only on the profit that you earned. I'll be talking about income taxes in USA and income taxes in India. In India taxes are very high compared to USA for the same income. In USA, you can get away with 15% Federal income taxes on $100K USD of income, as you fall into lower middle class category. But the same income in India will put you in top 0.1% of earners, and will likely result in 30% or more in income taxes.

There are 23 or so countries in the world that don't levy income taxes. However, they do levy all sort of other taxes to make up for income taxes. Many of these are oil producing countries in middle east, while some of them are tourism dependent countries. Few ex are UAE, Qatar, Kuwait, Bahamas Islands, Cayman Islands, Maldives and bunch of small countries.Taxes in some Europeon countries are as high as 70%. So, USA is in the low tax countries of the west where max tax rate is 45%. Actually, if you are super rich, you pay close to 20% in taxes.

 

Following Sections are covered:

1. USA Income taxes:

2. India Income Taxes:

3. Tax calculator

4. Filing USA taxes

2. Filing India Taxes

 

This is continuation of Elementary and Middle school maths. Here the topics are advanced. The STAAR question papers can be found for high school in the texas.gov website mentioned in Maths section.

Algebra:

We can move on to algebra 2 section for high school: https://www.mathsisfun.com/algebra/index-2.html

You may want to refresh Algebra 1 section from above website too (see in elementary maths section for details)

Functions:

Functions are a heart of algebra, as anything involving variables is a function. All real life processes are described in terms of functions, and then we solve them.

Khan Academy (Functions and Matrices): https://www.khanacademy.org/math/linear-algebra/matrix-transformations

Though some lessons from above are for Matrices, look at lessons on Functions, transformation, Inverse Functions.

A function is a relation where every domain (x) value maps to only one range (y) value. Strictly function is something that takes a set of values (called as range) and maps it to another set of values (called as range). NOTE: one "x" can have only one "y" and NOT more than one. As an ex: y=f(x)=x^2 always has only one y value for each x value. It's not possible that you plug in x=2 and you end up getting 2 y values. However, 2 x values can map to same y value, i.e both x=2 and x=-2 map to same y=4. So, y=x^2 is a function, but y=sq root(x) is not a function, as x=4 gives two y values, y=2 and y=-2. If we don't consider -ve values of sq root, then sq root becomes a function.

Inverse Function: Very important concept. A function f maps values from x to y. An inverse function [written as f-1(x) ] gets us from y back to x. Consider f(x)=x^2. Inverse function for this would be f-1(x)=√x. Let's choose x=2, then f(2)=4. Now if we apply inverse to 4, we should get 2. g(x)=√x. g(4)=2, So, g is an inverse function, i.e g(x)=f-1(x)=√x. F(x)=x is an identity function, as values remain same on transformation. It's inverse is also same, f-1(x)=x. Any given function has a unique inverse function, i.e it can't have more than one inverse function.

Mathematically f-1(f(x))=x and f(f-1(x))=x

In other way to visualize, functions are deviation from the line y=x, and inverse functions are deviations from that same straight line, but in opposite direction.

Power and Exponential Function:

We looked at power functions (X^2, x^3) etc. Exponential func are 2^x, 3^x, etc. Exponential functions rise even faster than power functions as x appears in the exponent.

The plot below show the power function and it's inverse (which is sq root), and also exp func and it's inverse (which is log).

  • Given f(x)=x^n, it's inverse is  f-1(x)=x^(1/n).  f-1(f(x))=f-1(x^n) = (x^n)^(1/n)=x^(n*1/n)=x^1=x. Also, doing the other way, f(f-1(x))= f(x^(1/n))=(x^(1/n))^n = x
  • Given f(x)=a^x, it's inverse is  f-1(x)= Logax (where "a" is the base of log). So, other way to look at log func is a^?=x.  f-1(f(x))=f-1(a^x) = a^(Logax) = x.. Also, doing the other way, f(f-1(x))= f(Logax) = a^(Logax)= x

Plot of power function with inverse func:

Diagram showing power Func

 

Plot of exponential function with inverse func:

Diagram showing exponential Func

 

Log properties:

Link (with derivations) => https://www.cuemath.com/algebra/properties-of-logarithms/

NOTE: When base of log func is e, we call it natural log and write it as ln (w/o any base) instead of writing it as loga which is same as writing ln a.

  • logₐ mn = logₐ m + logₐ n (product property)
  • logₐ m/n = logₐ m - logₐ n (quotient property)
  • logₐ mn = n logₐ m (power property)
  • logb a = (loga) / (logb) (change of base property) => Here we can change the log base to any new base "c". 

From above properties, we can get many interesting properties: 

  • alogₐ x = x => This is very important property, that is used in a lot of log problems. This can be proved by taking log of both sides. Basically we are taking inverse of original function, so we get back "x".
  • logbnam= (m/n)*logba. (It's b^n in base of LHS). This can also be proved by writing y=logbnam => y/m=logbna => b^(n*y/m)=a => n*y/m=logb a  => y=(m/n)*logb a which is same as RHS

FIXME: upload hand drawn diagrams.

 


 

Polynomials:

We looked at algebraic expressions (i.e xy+2ab+4, etc) in the elementary maths section.

Each of xy, 2ab, 4 is a term. So, there are 3 terms in this expression above.

Terms are separated by +/-. anything  separated by mult or div is not a term. If there is 1 term, it's called a monomial, 2 terms is called binomial, 3 terms is called trinomial, and so on. This whole family of terms is called polynomial. So, monomials are polynomials with only 1 term, binomial are poly with 2 terms and so on. NOTE: terms can only be counted once we have reduced the expression to a sum of product form with no parentheses remaining.

Degree of a poly: The greatest power or exponent of a polynomial is called its degree. So, x.y + a+5 has a degree 2, since it's first term has 1 power from x, and 1 power from y. Note that we add exponents within a term, even though the var are different and they can't be added. The reason we do that is because Degree of a poly refers to how fast the function is exponentially inc or dec. So, even if x and y are diff var, but func itself is moving at the rate of square (i.e if y is made same var as x, then it becomes x^2). Poly with degree of 2 is called Quadratic.

Polynomials are very important class of equations, and almost everything that is modeled in real life is expressed as polynomials. In fact, it has been proved that any complicated shape can be expressed as a polynomial. Each power of x has a constant multiplied with it called as "coefficient"

Addition/Subtraction: Polynomials can be added/subtracted. Only the terms with the same power of x can be reduced by adding/subtracting.

ex: 5x^2 + 2x + 7 + 9x^2+5x+5 = (5x^2+9x^2) + (2x+5x) + (7+5) = 14x^2 + 9x +12

Multiplication: Polynomials can be multiplied, by using the law of exponents explained in elementary maths section.

ex: (9x+5)*(7x^2+3x) = 9x*(7x^2+3) + 5(7x^2+3x) = 63x^3 + 27x + 35x^2 + 15x = 63x^3 + 35x^2 + 42x

Division: Division of polynomials looks tricky, but it can be done using same division method that we use for integer division. We find a multiplicand that can cancel out the term with the highest power of x. Then we move to the next highest power of x, and keep on doing so, until we are done, or left with a remainder.

ex: (2x^2+5x+7) / (x+5) => x+5 | (2x^2+5x+7) | 2x => x+5 | (2x^2+5x+7) | (2x-5) with remainder 32. We can check the answer by multiplying (x+5) and (2x-5). That gives: 2x^2+5x-25. If we add remainder of 32, then we get the original term: (2x^2+5x+7)

Other way to solve this is to divide the numerator in chunks of (x+5). i.e [ 2x(x+5) -5(x+5) +32 ] / (x+5) = 2x(x+5)/(x+5) -5(x+5)/(x+5) +32(x+5) = 2x - 5 + 32/(x+5)

ex: (3x^2+6x)/(x+2) =3x(x+2)/(x+2) = 3x

 

 

Plotting of Y vs X:

We looked at plotting of eqn of straight line in elementary school maths. High schools expands on that basic knowledge to plot more complicated shapes. We can plot polynomials too, though they are harder to plot. High school limits plotting polynomials to degree=2, which is quadratic equations. We also learn to plot exponential functions here. I've 2 plots below.

Plot 1: This details plotting straight line (linear function) and a curved u shaped line (quadratic function).

Plot of linear and quadratic functions

Plot 2: This details plotting simple exponential functions.

Plot of exponential functions

 

 

Algebraic Formula:

There are Formula for algebraic expression that help us in solving more complicated expressions by reducing or expanding them. Some common ones are:

  • (a + b)2 = a2 + 2ab + b2
  • (a – b)2 = a2 – 2ab + b2
  • a2 – b2 = (a – b)(a + b)
  • (a + b)3 = a3 + b3 + 3ab(a + b)
  • (a – b)3 = a3 – b3 – 3ab(a – b) 
  • a3 – b3 = (a – b)(a2 + ab + b2)
  • a3 + b3 = (a + b)(a2 – ab + b2)

Ex: To solve 57^2-43^2 => we can use identity a2 – b2 = (a – b)(a + b) => (57-43)(57+43)=6*100=600. If we try to solve it by taking squares, it will take lot longer.

Ex: To solve 57^2+43^2 => we can use identity  (a + b)2 + (a - b)2 / 2 = (a2 + b2) => ( (57+43)^2 + (57-43)^2 ) /2 = 100^2 + 6^2 / 2 = 100036/2 = 500018

Binomial Theorem:

This is a generalization of (a+b)^n where n is any +ve integer n > 0.

Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binomial_theorem

Theorem was generalized by Newton to allow any real number n. Here (n r) is redefined as falling factorial, since factorial is only defined for integers. It was further generalized to allow complex numbers for x,y.

{\displaystyle (x+y)^{n}=\sum _{k=0}^{n}{n \choose k}x^{n-k}y^{k}=\sum _{k=0}^{n}{n \choose k}x^{k}y^{n-k}.}

Multinomial Theorem: The identity above is generalized to have more than 2 variables, and is called multinomial theorem.The general version (for +ve integer n > 0) is:

{\displaystyle (x_{1}+x_{2}+\cdots +x_{m})^{n}=\sum _{k_{1}+k_{2}+\cdots +k_{m}=n}{\binom {n}{k_{1},k_{2},\ldots ,k_{m}}}x_{1}^{k_{1}}x_{2}^{k_{2}}\cdots x_{m}^{k_{m}},}

 


 

Equations:

We looked at solving equations of 1 and 2 variables in the elementary maths section. We looked at linear equations there. Now we look at equations which are not linear in x and y, but have higher powers.

Equations of 1 variable:

Higher powers of x: Here x has higher powers to it. So, it's a polynomial in x. These equations don't have 1 solution for x, but multiple solutions. It has been proved that equation with powers of 2 (i.e x^2) have 2 solutions, x^3 have 3 solutions and so on. It has been proved that polynomial with power n, have n solution, which are called the n roots of the polynomial.

It's the Fundamental theorem of Algebra and applies to coefficients with complex coefficients too:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_theorem_of_algebra

Finding n roots of any polynomial of degree n is not easy, but we know the relation b/w these n roots (roots may be real or imaginary, and may be repeated or unique) via Vieta's Formula: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vieta%27s_formulas

Complex numbers are explained in advanced Maths section.

We know how to solve x^2, but higher powers of x are harder to solve, and above formulae is used for solving it. Student is not expected to solve those, so we'll just concentrate on x^2 and x^3 (Degree of 2 and 3 are really popular questions in Maths olympiads).

Quadratic Polynomial (Power of 2): ex: x^2 + x = 5. This is called a quadratic equation. This can be solved via 2 ways:

1. Solving by using formula: It can be solved by using the formula for a*x^2 + b*x + c =0.Teach the kid how to derive that formula.

Derivation is not that hard: Look here: https://www.mathsisfun.com/algebra/quadratic-equation-derivation.html

An alternate way to solve is by using the same method as the derivation above. So, solve by making a square in form of (Ax+B)^2 -D + C  = 0. Now bring numbers on RHS, take a square root, and solve for x.

ex: 2x^2+4x - 6 =0 => 2 (X^2 + 2x - 3) =0 => (x+1)^2 - 1 - 3 =0 => (X+1)^2 = 4 => (x+1) = +2,-2 => x=1,-3. So, this is exactly how quadratic eqn solution was derived above.

2. Other way to solve it is to bring it into the form a(x-p1)(x-p2)=0 where p1,p2 are the two solutions (or the 2 roots). There are 2 cases to consider.

  1. When coeff "a" = 1: Then x^2 - (p1+p2)*x + p1*p2 = 0. So, -b/a = the sum of the two roots = p1+p2, while c/a = product of 2 roots = p1*p2. This is a very important property used in factorizing the middle term. When p1,p2 are integers, then it's easier to find 2 such integers that will work. We can't rely on factorizing this if solution involve decimals. NOTE: IF the roots are p1 and p2, then the factors are -p1 and -p2. Since, -p1 + -p2 = b and (-p1)*(-p2)=c, for factorizing, we need to find 2 numbers such that their sum is b and product is c. Then the roots will be negative of those numbers, i.e if the factors are 2,3, then roots will be -2, -3. Important to remember this.
    1. ex: x^2 - 5x + 6 =0 => x^2-3x-2x+6=0 => x(x-3) - 2(x-3) =0 => (x-3)(x-2)=0 => 2 soln for this eqn: x=2 or x=3 (p1+p2=-5, p1*p2=6) => We are looking for 2 numbers whose sum is -5, but whose product is 6. One such pair of numbers is -2,-3. So, we get 2 factors as -2,-3.
  2. When coeff "a" ≠ 1: Above method of factorizing needs to be modified. We can always reduce such eqn to form where a=1 (by dividing whole quad eqn by a"), but then the coeff, b and c may become non integers, which is harder for humans to factorize. If roots are p1, p2, then a*[x^2 - (p1+p2)*x + p1*p2] = 0. Here a*(p1+p2)=-b, and a*p1*p2=c. So, the 2 roots p1, p2 satisfy p1+p2=-b/a and p1*p2=-c/a. What about the factors? Middle coeff "b" needs to separated into 2 terms -a*p1 and -a*p2 s.t (a*p1 + a*p2 = b), and (-(a*p1)*-(a*p2)=a*(a*p1*p2)=a*c). So, 2 factors are such that their sum is b, but their product is a*c. So, the 2 factors are -(a*p1) and -(a*p2), and the roots are p1, p2. Once factors are found, roots can be found by dividing the factors by -a.
    1. ex: 10*x^2-9*x+2=0 => Here we are looking for 2 numbers s.t their sum is -9 and their product is 10*2=20. 2 such numbers are -4 and -5. So factors of middle term are -5x, -4x => 10*x^2 - 5*x - 4*x + 2 =0 => 5*x(2x-1) - 2(2*x-1)=0 => (2*x-1)(5*x-2)=0 => The 2 roots are x=1/2, 2/5. This can also be solved for roots by dividing whole eqn by 10, and then looking for 2 numbers such that p1+p2=-9/10, p1*p2=2/10. One such pair is -4/10, -5/10. But it's much harder to see this as it's in fractions. So, we do it the other way suggested, as that keeps the 2 numbers as integers. The 2 roots can be found from the factors by dividing b -a=-10. So, 2 roots are -4/-10, -5/-10 = 2/5,1/2.

Solving for these eqn the other way round is lot easier. i.e eqn with form (x-2)(x-3) is lot easier to expand than solving eqn of form x^2 - 5x + 6 =0.

Cubic Polynomial (Power of 3): ex: x^3 + x^2 + x = 5. This is called a cubic equation. This is harder to solve. We can solve to by using Vieta's Formula to get relation among the 3 cubes which states:

For the 3 roots of a*x^3 + b*x^2 + c*x + d =0, p1+p2+p3 = -b/a, p1*p2 + p2*p3 + p1*p3 = c/a, p1*p2*p3 = -d/a.

Putting in the 3 roots => a*(x-p1)*(x-p2)*(x-p3)=0

Again, 2 ways to solve it, as in quadratic formula above. There are 2 cases to consider.

  1. When coeff "a" = 1: This is easy and same as quadratic case. Find 3 integers whose sum is -b, and product is -d. Those will be the roots. One way to solve it by guess, and see if you can get values for p1, p2, p3 (provided p1, p2, p3 are integers). Easy to find all possibilities of such integers, as there aren't too many combo possible.
  2. When coeff "a" ≠ 1: This gets harder. If roots are p1, p2, p3, then a*(x-p1)*(x-p2)*(x-p3)=0 => a*[x^3 - (p1+p2+p3)*x^2 + (...)x + p1*p2*p3] = 0. Here a*(p1+p2+p3)=-b, and a*p1*p2*p3=-d. Middle coeff "b" needs to separated into 3 terms -a*p1, -a*p2 and -a*p3 s.t -(a*p1 + a*p2 + a*p3 = b), and (-a*p1*-a*p2*-a*p3=-a*a*(a*p1*p2*p3)=a*a*d). So, 3 factors are such that their sum is b, but their product is a*a*d (NOTE the a^2 term here instead of 1 term in quadratic eqn). The factors are -a*p1, -a*p2, -a*p3, and then we can get thr roots by dividing the factors by -a.
    1. ex: 10*x^3 - 39*x^2 + 29*x - 6 = 0 (AMC 12 Maths Olympiad 2022). => Here we are looking for 3 numbers s.t their sum is -39 and their product is 10*10*-6=-600. Factorizing 600, we get 600=2^3*3*5^2. If we choose 3 factors as -30, -5, -4, then we see that we get  3 such numbers. So, 3 roots are obtained by dividing these factors by -a = 30/10, 5/10 and 4/10 = 3,1/2,2/5.
    2. There is another way to solve the above cubic poly. Expand x^2 coefficient and x coefficient into 2 components and then get 1 root. The other 2 roots will come from the quadratic eqn that we know how to solve. We ignore a for now, and assume a=1. Here we see that sum of these modified roots is 39, while product of these modified roots is 6. So, roots may be 1,1,6 or 2,3,1. We take 1 root as 3, then we break coeff 39 into 2 parts such that 1 factor is 3. If one part is 30, then we get 3 as a root => 10*x^3 - 30*x^2 - 9*x^2 + 27*x + 2*x - 6 =0 => 10*x^2(x-3) -9*x(x-3) + 2(x-3) =0 => (x-3)(10*x^2-9*x+2)=0. So 1 root is 3. The other 2 roots are from quadratic eqn 10*x^2-9*x+2=0, This has been solved above for roots=1/2, 2/5. This method works only because one the roots happened to be an integer. If all 3 roots were non integers, then this method won't work. It's a quick and dirty visual way to break components into factors.

Radical equation (power of 1/2 or square root, cube root, etc): ex: √(x+2) = 4. These are little tricky to solve. We solve them by converting them to quadratic eqn (for sq root) or to higher powers of x (for cube roots, etc)

One way to solve these is to square or cube both sides of eqn so that sq root, cube root,, etc are gone and we are left with just x, x^2, x^3 or so on, which we know how to solve.

ex: (x+2)^1/2 = 4 => sq both sides => (x+2) = 16 => x=14.

ex: (x+2)^1/2 = -4 => sq both sides => (x+2) = 16 => x=14. Here sq root of a number is set to -ve number. Strictly speaking, x=14 is a solution for this eqn too. However, for sq root eqn, we generally mean the +ve square root solution only. The -ve sq root solution is called extraneous soln, and is generally not considered correct. That's why we should plug in our answer, to see if we get the real soln or not. We need to throw away extraneous soln, and there is no way to know which soln is extraneous w/o plugging in our solved numbers back into the original eqn.

ex: √4 = +2,-2 => This has 2 soln (squaring 2 or -2, both yield 4). However, when we say sq root, we generally mean +ve sq root, so +2 is the real soln, and -2 is extraneous soln which is not considered correct.

NOTE: I'm guessing the reason we don't consider both +ve and -ve soln for √X is because √X won't be a function anymore, i.e for any value of X, we'll have 2 Y, which isn't a function.

Here's a link to solve radical eqn: https://www.mathsisfun.com/algebra/radical-equations-solving.html

 

Equations of 2 variable:

Higher powers of x and y: Here x and y have higher powers to them. These are even harder to solve, so calculus or computer programs are used to solve it. Depending on powers of x and y, they can have more than 1 solution.

ex: x^2 + y^2 = 13, x^3 + y = 19

Equations of more than 2 variables: Here we have n variables, as x, y, z. We can have linear or higher powers. These are also not expected to be solved by hand, except may be simple linear equation of 3 var  = x, y, z.

ex: x+y+z=34, x+2y+z=38, 2x+y+z=44 => We can solve these 3 equations the same way we solve for 2 equations.

 


 

Series:

Arithmetic Series or Arithmetic Progression (AP): This is a series of number where each number differs from the next one by a constant number.

ex: 1, 5, 9, 13, ... => Here the difference between consecutive numbers is 4

finding sum of AP with n numbers, where a=1st number, and d=difference. i.e a, a+d, a+2d, a+3d, ... a+(n-1)d

Sum = a +     (a+d)           + (a+2d) + ....+  (a+(n-1)*d)

Sum = a + (a+(n-1)*d)    +  ....                + (a+d)

=> 2*Sum = 2*a + (2*a+n*d)*(n-1)

=> 2*Sum = 2*a*n + n*d*(n-1)

=> Sum = n*[a + (n-1)*d/2]

ex: For simple AP series of S=1+2+3+...+N => Here a=1, d=1, n=N

=> S=N*[1+(N-1)/2] = N*(N+1)/2

Geometric series or Geometric Progression (GP): This is a series where the ratio between consecutive numbers is constant

ex: 1, 4, 16, 64, ... => Here the ratio between consecutive numbers is 4

finding sum of GP with n numbers, where a=1st number, and r=ratio i.e a, a*r, a*(r^2), a*r^3, ... a*(r^(n-1))

Sum = a +     (a*r)           + (a*r^2) + ....+  (a*r^(n-1))

r.Sum =          (a*r)           + (a*r^2) + ... + (a*r^(n-1)) + (a*r^n)

=> Sum - r.Sum = a - (a*r^n) => NOTE: all other terms cancel out

=> Sum(1-r) = a(1-r^n)

=> Sum = a(1-r^n) / (1-r)

ex: For simple GP series of S = 1 + 2 + 4 +8 + ... 2^N => Here a=1, r=2, n=N+1

=> S=1*(1-2^(N+1))/(1-2) = 2^(N+1)-1 => This summation is very useful in Binary number conversion to decimal in computer science

Sum of squares of first n numbers: This is proved by induction to be n(n+1)(2n+1)/6 (see in advanced math section for proof).

W/O induction it's hard. However a neat technique exists.

(n+1)^3 - 1^3 = 3n^3+3n^2+3n

Summation from i=1 to i=N for the expression Σ[(i+1)^3-i^3] will simply be (N+1)^3 - 1^3 as all terms in the series cancel out with each other (since we are subtracting the next number as well as adding the next number). => call it eqn (1)

However, if we simply expand (i+1)^3 into constituent terms, we can also write above expr as  Σ[(i+1)^3-i^3] =  Σi^3 + Σ3*(i^2) + Σ3*i + Σ1 - Σi^3 = 3Σ(i^2) + 3Σi + Σ1 = 3Σ(i^2) + N(N+1)/2 + N => call it eqn (2)

Eqn (1) and (2) are same. So, equating them, we get => (N+1)^3 - 1^3 =  3Σ(i^2) + N(N+1)/2 + N 

=> N^3+3N^2 + 3N = 3Σ(i^2) + N(N+1)/2 + N 

=> 3Σ(i^2) =  N^3+3N^2 + 3N - N^2/2 - 3N/2 

=> 3Σ(i^2) =  N^3+3/2*N^2 + N/2 

=> Σ(i^2) =  1/3*[N^3+3/2*N^2 + N/2] = N/6*(2N^2+3N+1) = N/6*[(N+1)(2N+1)] => which is the same formula as above

Sum of cubes of first n numbers: This is proved by induction to be [n(n+1)/2]^2 (see in advanced math section for proof). It's just square of sum of 1st n numbers.

To find the formula itself for cubes, we can use the same technique as above. Little longer, but nothing different.

Sum of ith power of first n numbers:There is a general formula involving Bernoulli's numbers and coefficients. Ask ChatGPT for formula.

 


 

Simple and Compound Interest:

This is a topic that is introduced in Elementary maths, but I included it here, since compund interest requires solving eqn with higher powers of X.

Simple Interest: Introduce the concept of principal and interest when money is deposited in a bank. Introduce the concept of rate per annum, as well as per quarter, per month, or rate per day. It should be clear that all these rates mean different effective rate.

SI for T years = P*(R/100)*T => Where P=principal, R=rate in % p.a, T=total time in years

Total Principal after T years = P *( 1+R*T/100)

Compound Interest: Compound interest is the compunded interest, where you get interest on the interest too. This seems more fair, since if the bank didn't give you interest on your earned interest, then you scould withdraw that interest, put that interest amount in other bank, and start earning earning interest on that.

CI for 1st year is same as SI for 1st year, if interest rate is per annum

CI (for 1st year) = P*(R/100)

A1 = Total Principal after 1 year = P *( 1+R/100)

CI (for 2nd year) = A1*(R/100)

A2 = Total Principal after 2 years = A1+ A1*R/100 = A1*(1+R/100)

CI (for 3rd year) = A2*(R/100)

A3 = Total Principal after 3 years = A2+ A2*R/100 = A2*(1+R/100) = A1*(1+R/100)^2 = P*(1+R/100)^3

Similarly AT = Total Principal after T years = P*(1+R/100)^T

So, Total Principal after T years = P *( 1+R/100)^T

Conclusion: As can be seen above, CI is more than SI for any year after the 1st year, and total Principal with compound interest is lot more than that with simple interest.

 


 

Matrix:

Matrix is one the simple topics, but rather important one to learn. The usage of matrix is not apparent, as it's just a way of representing numbers. Matrices are widely used in computer programming to rep a large set of numbers, and operate on them efficiently.

Good material here: https://www.mathsisfun.com/algebra/matrix-introduction.html

Various operations of +, -, *, / are explained on link above. Most interesting is the multiplication of 2 matrices which is known as the "dot product" of 2 matrices. Most important thing to remember about matrix multiplication is that:

To multiply an m×n matrix by an n×p matrix, the ns must be the same, and the result is an m×p matrix.

i.e (mXn) dot (nXp) = (mXp) matrix

So ... multiplying a 1×3 by a 3×1 gets a 1×1 result. But multiplying a 3×1 by a 1×3 gets a 3×3 result.

NOTE: Terms "Multiplication of 2 matrices" and "Dot product of 2 matrices" are used interchangeably. It's OK to use them with the understanding that multiplication is actually dot product. Multiplication of a matrix with a scalar is simply multiplying each entry of the matrix with that scalar. So, be careful when you see these terms.

 


 

Advanced:

Advanced maths topics on Limits, calculus, etc are in next section. I'll start that section in some time. Note that if you are preparing for SAT exam, then everything until is point is all you need. SAT Maths don't need you to know any advanced stuff about calculus, etc. Basic linear and quadratic equation solution, and basic High school maths can easily fetch you 100% score in SAT Maths.

 


 

Indian Population and Economy:

In India, there are about 250M households (as of 2011, implying 5 people per household which is 3rd highest in the world), of which 140M households (comprising 700M people) are deprived and earn less than $2K/year. That implies less than $5/day for these poor people to feed a family of 5 (implying feeding on less than $1/day). Next 75M households (comprising 400M people) make between $2K-$5K per year. Again, less than $15/day for whole family to feed. In essence, 80% of the population earns less than $1/hour and feeds on less than a $1/day. As per World Food Programme (WFP), 25% of population is in extreme poverty earning less than $2/day. About 800M are poor, and gap between rich and poor is widening as fast as the economy is growing. Next 30M households is the so called middle class, which comprises of 160M people. They make between $5K - $30K and will definitely be considered poor in any western country. That brings us to top 1% of country who are considered rich. These are 3M households comprising 15M people.

https://desiparinda.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/6a00d8341dd33453ef0147e3b81a02970b.png?w=560

As of 2015, about 4 crore (or 40M) Indians filed Income tax returns of which 2 crore paid taxes (meaning they had an income of over $5K). That implies that about 10% of households paid income taxes (population wise, it's just 3% of population). Total number of crorepaties (people making over $200K/year) was 50K only. In contrast, in USA about 15M people make more than that per year. Total income was 35L crore declared on these income tax returns (approx $0.7T assuming $1=Rs50). Companies filed about 1M returns with gross income of Rs. 11L crore ($0.2T).

http://www.indpaedia.com/ind/index.php/Income_Tax_India:_Statistics

 

 

This section deals with Retirement in terms of money and NOT in terms of age.

Retirement refers to Financial freedom. So, why would anyone want to get financial freedom? First of all, you should have the freedom to do anything you want to do, and say NO to things you don't want to do. As I discussed earlier in other articles, most of the people are part of the fake economy, where they get out of their house everyday to dig up a hole for half the day and then fill up that hole for the other half of the day. Why spend your labor doing something that produces nothing? Instead of doing that, you would be better enjoying the life God has given us.

I'll talk about all the strategies that you can use to save enough to achieve financial freedom.

When we talked about GDP, we said that US GDP grows by about 5% a year, and it reflects the total amount of money growth in the system. So, any money you invest anywhere has to grow by 5% every year, just to keep up with the money growth. I think of GDP growth (minus the population growth) as real inflation.

There are 3 places where you can invest in order to grow your savings:

1. Banks: Depositing money in banks is a sure way to lose money every year. With interest rates at 0%, you lose about 5% of your principle amount every year, since GDP grows by 5% a year. So, in 30 years, $1 deposited in bank is reduced to 10 cents when real inflation is considered. Chances are very high that deposit rates may go negative in future (as of 2020, it's still positive). Read in "Banks" section for more details.

2. Bonds: Instead of lending money to banks, you lend it to institutions or private companies. Of course the rate you get here will be higher than what you can get by depositing money in banks, but the money is not insured by FDIC or any other agency. So, if the private company goes bankrupt, almost all of your prinicipal is gone. Read in "Bonds" section for more details.

3. Housing: Housing is one area which has put even "Warren Buffet" to shame. The return that anyone in USA can get in housing is more than what Warren Buffet ever made on any investment in his life. This insane return in housing market (with leveraged money) has been going on for a decade, and with Government supporting housing forever, I don't see how it can burst, unless "FED" is abolished al together. Read in "Housing" section for more details.

4. Stocks: This is my favorite part. This is the mother of all Ponzi schemes and is run by an arm of Govt itself, known as "FED". See in Stocks section on why this Ponzi scheme will run for as long as there is a money printing entity. If this crashes, then housing will crash too, along with all the other assets too. So, if you have to invest in a Ponzi scheme, invest in one that is the mother of all, as it drives all other ponzis. That will be the last one to fail.

Now that we have figured out that stocks are the best investment vehicle for our future returns relative to GDP, let's explore the strategies for retirement in next few sections.

 

 

 

Since English Reading and Writing Comprehensive skills are considered an essential part of US education system, I've added this section to help with that.

From early on, Reading and Writing is encouraged in USA. With new hi tech gadgets, writing is on the decline, and you can see that writing tests are slowly getting omitted from many regular tests. This is really sad, as Reading and Writing are 2 skills that go hand in hand. If you are not able to write a word, you will have to work harder to remember the spelling of that word. Also, writing on a piece of paper with a pencil allows you to make a mental image of your writing. Writing tests have become more like reading tests, where the standardized tests now ask you to figure out if something is written in a correct way or not, instead of you writing it.

Vocabulary: An essential part of reading is to have a good vocabulary. As a kid, we start with very few words (may be 100 or so), but very quickly move on to 1000's of words.

Webster mentions that there are about 1M English words. However, it's complicated to count total words in any language.

  • First the reason is that any language is always expanding, so new words are always getting formed.
  • Secondly, one language gets influenced by other language, and some words from other language start getting used in our language which becomes a gray line.
  • Thirdly, various forms of same word exist, as drive, drove, drives, etc, OR one word with multiple different meanings exist, which may be counted as separate words or as 1 word, depending on one's taste.

There is a very a good article here on how many words different languages have and how many do you need to learn: https://www.lingholic.com/how-many-words-do-i-need-to-know/

As per above article, English has 171,476 words in current use, 47,156 obsolete words and 615,100 definitions. You will find the reference of 100K word families in English language mentioned elsewhere too. A native English speaking person knows between 10,000 (uneducated) to 20,000 (educated) word families.

In part 2 of the series, the author says that the average active vocabulary of an adult English speaker is of around 20,000 words, with a passive one of around 40,000 words. Active vocabulary is one that you use, while passive vocabulary is one that you recognize but don't use. Further he states that the first 25 words are used in 33% of everyday writing, the first 100 words appear in 50% of adult and student writing, and the first 1,000 words are used in 89% of every day writing! Of course, as we progressively move to a higher percentage, the number of words starts to dramatically increase (especially after 95% of comprehension), but it has been said that a vocabulary of just 3000 words provides coverage for around 95% of common texts (such as news items, blogs, etc.). We want to know these 10K-20K words from active vocabulary, that are used in spoken and written English, though not commonly.

If you learn even 1 new word a day, you will learn about 3K new words in a span of 10 years. I remember when I prepared for my GRE, I had this GRE prep book that had 3K words. I was told by experts that if I learnt these 3K words, I would be able to answer all vocabulary questions. I was surprised, since English language had so many more words, so how would just knowing 3K more words help. Now I  know, how extra 3K words can add so much to your vocabulary !!

CEFR (Common European Framework of Reference) is a description of the language abilities of students at different levels of learning. A is lower level, B is intermediate level, while C is advanced level.

  • A1/A2 level: It's beginners level. At A2 level, you have a vocabulary of about 1500 words. It takes about 200 hours of studying english to reach this level. You can talk with english speakers and read simple texts at this level.
  • B1/B2 level. It's intermediate level. At B2 level, you have a vocabulary of about 4000 words. It takes about 600 hours of studying english to reach this level. You can talk fluently with other English speakers on any complex topic. You can live and work in any english speaking country. You have confidence and control when speaking, writing, and reading.
  • C1/C2 level: It's advanced level. At C1 level, you have a vocabulary of about 8000 words. It takes about 800 hours of studying english to reach this level. C2 is the mastery level, and you have a vocabulary of about 16000 words at this level. you talk, read and write just as a native speaker of the language.

This is just the start, where you start having mastery similar to native speaker of the language. This is where we want our vocabulary to be. To have your vocabulary at a level where you can read newspapers, magazines, etc without trying to guess meanings of words, you need to be at C2 level These are the words that are not that common in day to day speech, but used frequently in media papers, journals, etc

As an example, vocabulary.com lists these 100 words that are expected of a high school Freshman (basically 9th grade sudent) to know.

https://www.vocabulary.com/lists/79298

or high school vocabulary test here:

https://www.buzzfeed.com/angelospagnolo/can-you-pass-this-high-school-vocab-quiz

If you know all the words above, then you have vocabulary at C2 level. We want to get to a level of English speaking high school graduate.

I've a section titled "Word of the Day" that will aid us in our vocabulary quest.

http://maaldaar.com/index.php/word-of-the-day

Reading:

We need to develop our comprehending and reading skill This comes with reading a lot of different kinds of subjects.

One good starting point is some good articles here:

https://linguapress.com/advanced.htm