Independent Variable

A number or factor used to compute other numbers.

Let’s say your company wants to give free baseball tickets to the upper 20% of the junior class. There are 120 people in the junior class so you will have to buy 24 (120 x.20) tickets. The dependent variable is 24 because you can’t figure out the number of tickets without knowing how many students there are in the junior class. 120 is the independent variable because its value is not dependent on any other number.

https://accounting.uworld.com/cpa-review/lc/accounting-dictionary/term/independent-variable/