Bounds for the 3x+1 Problem using Difference Inequalities

We study difference inequality systems for the 3x+1 problem introduced by the first author in 1989. These systemes can be used to give lower bounds for the number of integers below x that contain 1 in their forward orbit under the 3x+1 map. Previous methods gave away some information in these inequalities. We give an improvement which apparantly extracts full information from the inequalities. By computer aided proof we show that at least x^{0.84} of the integers below x contain 1 in their forward orbit under the 3x+1 map.