pre_text: notes to consolidated financial statements 2014 ( continued ) becton , dickinson and company ( b ) these reclassifications were recorded to interest expense and cost of products sold . additional details regarding the company's cash flow hedges are provided in note 13 . on august 25 , 2016 , in anticipation of proceeds to be received from the divestiture of the respiratory solutions business in the first quarter of fiscal year 2017 , the company entered into an accelerated share repurchase ( "asr" ) agreement . subsequent to the end of the company's fiscal year 2016 and as per the terms of the asr agreement , the company received approximately 1.3 million shares of its common stock , which was recorded as a $ 220 million increase to common stock in treasury . note 4 2014 earnings per share the weighted average common shares used in the computations of basic and diluted earnings per share ( shares in thousands ) for the years ended september 30 were as follows: .
post_text: average common and common equivalent shares outstanding 2014 assuming dilution 217536 207509 197709 upon closing the acquisition of carefusion corporation ( 201ccarefusion 201d ) on march 17 , 2015 , the company issued approximately 15.9 million of its common shares as part of the purchase consideration . additional disclosures regarding this acquisition are provided in note 9 . options to purchase shares of common stock are excluded from the calculation of diluted earnings per share when their inclusion would have an anti-dilutive effect on the calculation . for the years ended september 30 , 2016 , 2015 and 2014 there were no options to purchase shares of common stock which were excluded from the diluted earnings per share calculation. .
table: 2016 2015 2014
table: Average common shares outstanding 212,702 202,537 193,299
table: Dilutive share equivalents from share-based plans 4,834 4,972 4,410
table: Average common and common equivalent shares outstanding — assuming dilution 217,536 207,509 197,709
question: Analyse this data from a financial earnings document. what is the total number of outstanding shares from 2014-2016?