The least common multiple of {6,8,12} is 24. This can be intuitively figured by noting that any multiple of 12 is a multiple of 6 and that 12 is 1.5x larger than 8. That means we only have so multiple 12 by 2 and 8 by 3 for them to be equal. The GCF of {20,42,72} is 2 as the prime factorization of 20 is 2x2x5 and 42 is 2x3x7. That means even without having to check 72 (which is clearly even so 2 is a factor), we know that 2 is the greatest common factor that they could share. So X/Y = 24/2 = 12
You can use 27 $10 bills which gets your at a total of $270 then you can use 1 $5 bill so now you're at $275 then you can use 4 $1 bills that gets you at your total of $279. The least number of bills you can use is 32.