Problem

Source: 49th Austrian Mathematical Olympiad National Competition (Final Round, part 2, ) 31st May 2018 p3

Tags: number theory, combinatorics, prime



There are $n$ children in a room. Each child has at least one piece of candy. In Round $1$, Round $2$, etc., additional pieces of candy are distributed among the children according to the following rule: In Round $k$, each child whose number of pieces of candy is relatively prime to $k$ receives an additional piece. Show that after a sufficient number of rounds the children in the room have at most two different numbers of pieces of candy. (Proposed by Theresia Eisenkölbl)