=SUM(IF(B2:F2A2:E2,1,0))

which is an array formula, so commit with Ctrl-Shift-Enter

--

HTH

RP
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"Ted Metro" wrote in message
...
I think this is probably pretty easy.

I have a table here is the first row (starting at a1), with numbers in
individual columns

A B c d
e
1624 1433 1546 1244 1287
The columns represent years with A being the current year. I want to
count
how many years improved upon the previous year. The answer is two, C is
greater than D, and A is greater than B. Of course units went down from E
to
D and again from C to B. How do I write a formula that can analyze the
four
relationships across the five years and count how many times units went
down
from one year to the immediately following year?