Finding the Percent Difference

To find the percent difference between two numbers, use the following formula:

((New Value - Old Value) / Old Value) * 100

Example:

Let's say your 2005 value is in cell A1 and your 2004 value is in cell B1. You can use the following formula in a new cell to calculate the percent difference:

=((A1-B1)/B1)*100

If the result is positive, it means there was an increase from 2004 to 2005. If it's negative, there was a decrease.

Handling Zero Denominator

If you encounter a zero in the denominator (i.e. the old value is zero), you may get an error or a #DIV/0! message. To avoid this, you can add an IF statement to check if the old value is zero and handle it accordingly. Here's an example:

=IF(B1=0,"N/A",((A1-B1)/B1)*100)

This formula checks if B1 (the old value) is zero. If it is, it displays "N/A" instead of trying to divide by zero. If it's not zero, it calculates the percent difference as before.