The graph shows the number of farms in the United States for selected years since 1950. We can use the formula Number of farms = 0.001259x² - 5.039x + 5044 to get a good approximation of the number of farms for these years by substituting the year for x and evaluating the polynomial. For example, if x = 1960, the value of the polynomial is approximately 4.1, which differs from the data in the bar graph by only 0.1.

Evaluate the polynomial for each year, and then give the difference from the value in the graph.

Number of Farms in the U.S. since 1950

1990

Transcribed Image Text:

5.6 4.0 2.9 2.9 2.4 2.2 2.2 2.1 "50 '60 '70 '80 '90 '00 '10 '12 Year Farms (in millions)