Also question is, is 10 times less the same as 1/10 as much?
Usually, when someone's saying something like “ten times less” or “10x less”, they actually mean “one-tenth” - which if you multiply by 10 becomes the full value.
Furthermore, what does times smaller mean? “Times” means you're scaling something. “smaller” means you're scaling it down. I suspect English teachers would take “100 times smaller” means “1/100th.” For instance: The national debt of Algeria is 100 times smaller than the US.
Subsequently, one may also ask, what does 5 times less mean?
First, "A is 5 times less than B" does not mean "A = B - 5*A". That is never what a native speaker would think. "Times" is always multiplicative, so the amount of "less" is 5 times greater. "Less" can have a subtractive meaning, but it's much less common than being used as just a word of comparison (like "more").
What does 3 times as many mean in math?
Yes, bc has it right. People might say "three times more" when they mean "three times as much" but it usually isn't what they really mean. If the mother has x dollars, "three times more than x" means 3x + x -- "more than" means "add". "Three times as much" means 3x.
