Is $ (-1)^n(x-a)^n = (a-x)^n?$ If not, why? I came across this during an attempt at a Taylor series expansion (which I'm not very good at yet), and assumed this would be true because $(ab)^n = a^nb^n$. Plugged it into Wolfram Alpha, though, and it returns false. Can't figure out why this might be.

Wolfram is probably assuming $n$ is potentially complex, in which case it gets trickier - it is not true in general that $a^nb^n=(ab)^n$ if $n$ is complex. Indeed, it is already problematic with $n$ rational, say.
