Previously on Business42, we looked at the verbs we use when we discuss money. Today, we're going to continue that lesson and learn some nouns - or, how to describe money in different situations.
Before we begin that, however, let's look at the answers to the activity from the previous post. How many did you get correct?
ACTIVITY IDEA 1: answers
Before we begin that, however, let's look at the answers to the activity from the previous post. How many did you get correct?
ACTIVITY IDEA 1: answers
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined how much the company spends on external resources, such as suppliers, consultants and utilities (gas, electricity, etc.)
The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) started the meeting by revealing that our company paid consultants over £2 million last year. Even though our company made £20 million in profit last year, the CFO said that we should try to spend less on consultants. We could save up to £2 million this year if we end our business with these consultants or if we ask them to charge less money for their services.
Next, the Chief Accountant told us about how much money the company pays its employees. He told us that the average employee in our company earns £30,000 per year. Altogether, he said, employees cost the company around £500 million each year. The CFO announced that this was an acceptable amount of money to pay, so no changes will be made in this area.
Lastly, the Chief Accountant’s assistant brought up the issue of how much money the company gives to the charity Amnesty International. This charity raised over £30 million last year; £1 million of this came from our company. The CFO and the Chief Accountant agreed that we should continue giving money to this charity.
WORD FORMATION
All of the words which we have studied are verbs. Word formation involves turning a verb into a noun - and it is a very useful skill for expanding your vocabulary. Let's look at an example:
The verb to spend can be changed into the noun spendings.
But it's not natural English to say, "I spent spendings today." We use word formation to learn how to say a sentence in a different way:
There are other words which are related to the verb "to spend". Unlike "spendings", they don't directly match the spelling of the verb. Like "spendings", we shouldn't use them in a sentence with the verb. But we do often use them to talk about the money we spend. They are expenditure and outgoings.
We can't say, "I spent too much expenditure this month", or "I will spend my outgoings at Christmas". But when you see these words in a sentence, you know the sentence is talking about money which is spent. For example,you might hear in a business meeting:
OR
COLLOCATIONS
So, with "spend", what nouns can we use in a sentence? Here are the most popular examples:
- money - this is the most common noun, especially if you say how much money (for example, "five dollars", "2,000 euro". The company spends a lot of money on paper. / My mother spends €50 on groceries every week. [NOTE: preposition "on" is used if you're giving a noun]
- a fortune - this means "a lot of money". I spent a fortune today / She spends a fortune on shoes.
In summary then...
VERB: to spend
WORDS FORMED: spendings / expenditure / outgoings
COLLOCATIONS: money / fortune
Now, using this system (VERB - WORDS FORMED - COLLOCATIONS), let's look at the verbs from our previous blog post.
VERB: to cost
WORDS FORMED:
-cost(s) [The cost of this TV is too much (=This TV is too expensive)]
COLLOCATIONS:
- [money] [The car cost £2,000. / My jacket cost only $20 in the sale.]
- a fortune [It costs a fortune to stay in that hotel.]
VERB: to pay
WORDS FORMED: - payment [The cost of this TV is too much (=This TV is too expensive)]COLLOCATIONS: [Because "pay" is the most general money-related verb, we can use it with almost anything. Many of these words will appear again with other collocations]
- a salary / a wage / a bonus [The company pays salaries/wages monthly. / There are many arguments over how much banks pay their employees in bonuses.]
- a fee / a price / a fortune [When you book a flight, you usually have to pay a hidden fee. / He paid a high price for his flat. / If she takes legal action, she'll have to pay a fortune to her lawyer.]
- tax / insurance [You'll be arrested unless you pay your tax. / I have to pay for my car insurance policy.]
VERB: to earn
WORDS FORMED:
- earnings / income [Your income increases as you get older (=You earn more as you get older.)]
COLLOCATIONS:
- pay [This is an uncountable noun which is used generally to mean "the money which I was paid". For example, I earned my pay by working overtime.]
- a salary / a wage [Technically, there is a difference between these two words, but most people don't use it. The difference is that "a salary" is pay which is the same each month, and is measured by-the-year, whereas "wages" are paid by-the-hour. So an office worker would probably "earn a salary" but a barista in a café would probably "earn wages". More information here.
I earned a large salary when I worked in the marketing company. / He earns his wages in a supermarket.]
- a bonus [This is the money you earn for a specific reason (successful sales, Christmas-time) and it is paid once, not regularly like wages or a salary.I earned a huge bonus for meeting my sales targets this year! / The bonuses which bankers earn cause a lot of controversy in these difficult economic times.]
VERB: to save
WORDS FORMED:
- savings [I have enough savings to go travelling next year.]
COLLOCATIONS:
There are no collocations for this verb. The most common way to follow "save" is to describe how much money was saved. For example, I saved a little cash by shopping online or She saved £3,000 for her wedding.
VERB: to charge
WORDS FORMED:
- charge [The charge for this service is €20.]
COLLOCATIONS:
- a rate [The rate which they charge is a little expensive.]
- a fee [To fix my car, he charged me a fee of €200.]
- [an amount] [They'll charge you £50 if you cancel your flight.]
VERB: to make
WORDS FORMED:
There is no word-formation for this verb
COLLOCATIONS:
- money [This is the most general noun to use after the verb "to make". However, it's still used mostly in the business world (not in personal, everyday life). / He made money by betting on football matches. He made £200 in one day!]
- a profit [this is the money which a company keeps after it has paid its expenses. It's an extremely important noun in the business world, and is always used with the verb "to make". / The company made a large profit last year. / How much profit do you expect to make in your campaign?]
- a loss [This is the opposite of "profit": when a business spends more money than it has made, we say the business has "made a loss". It sounds strange to use "make" with a negative word like "loss", but it is natural. / He made a loss on his stock-market deal.]
VERB: to raise
WORDS FORMED:
There is no word-formation for this verb
COLLOCATIONS:
- funds [We use the verb "to raise" only when we discuss charities and not-for-profit organisations. "Funds" is a noun which describes the money which these organisations make. In other words "funds" apply to charities, just as "profits" apply to businesses. (It's also good to remember that a common full-time job in charities is "Fundraiser". / The charity raised £2m in funds from their advertising campaign. / At Christmastime, many volunteers can be seen raising funds for charity.]
ACTIVITY IDEA 2
It is possible to use our new vocabulary (of Words-Formed and Collocations) to re-write the business report from the previous Business42 blog post. Remember that the full text, with answers can be found at the top of this page. However, let's look at it again and highlight the words/sentences which we can re-phrase. First, an example.
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined how much the company spends on external resources
...can be changed to...
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined the company's expenditure on external resources
(Remember that the second sentence isn't better or worse than the first sentence - it's just different. It's important for all English students to know the different ways to say the same thing.)
To practice this week's vocabulary, re-write the words/phrases in blue.
Good luck, and keep practicing!
The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) started the meeting by revealing that our company paid consultants over £2 million last year. Even though our company made £20 million in profit last year, the CFO said that we should try to spend less on consultants. We could save up to £2 million this year if we end our business with these consultants or if we ask them to charge less money for their services.
Next, the Chief Accountant told us about how much money the company pays its employees. He told us that the average employee in our company earns £30,000 per year. Altogether, he said, employees cost the company around £500 million each year. The CFO announced that this was an acceptable amount of money to pay, so no changes will be made in this area.
Lastly, the Chief Accountant’s assistant brought up the issue of how much money the company gives to the charity Amnesty International. This charity raised over £30 million last year; £1 million of this came from our company. The CFO and the Chief Accountant agreed that we should continue giving money to this charity.
WORD FORMATION
 |
The verb to spend can be changed into the noun spendings.
But it's not natural English to say, "I spent spendings today." We use word formation to learn how to say a sentence in a different way:
"I spent more than I earned this month."
"My spendings were more than I earned this month."
There are other words which are related to the verb "to spend". Unlike "spendings", they don't directly match the spelling of the verb. Like "spendings", we shouldn't use them in a sentence with the verb. But we do often use them to talk about the money we spend. They are expenditure and outgoings.We can't say, "I spent too much expenditure this month", or "I will spend my outgoings at Christmas". But when you see these words in a sentence, you know the sentence is talking about money which is spent. For example,you might hear in a business meeting:
"The company's outgoings rose by 25% this year." (and you know that the company spent 25% more money than it did last year)
OR
"The accounting department is asking us to cut down our expenditure." (and you know that the accountants want us to spend less)
COLLOCATIONS
So, with "spend", what nouns can we use in a sentence? Here are the most popular examples:
- money - this is the most common noun, especially if you say how much money (for example, "five dollars", "2,000 euro". The company spends a lot of money on paper. / My mother spends €50 on groceries every week. [NOTE: preposition "on" is used if you're giving a noun]
- a fortune - this means "a lot of money". I spent a fortune today / She spends a fortune on shoes.
In summary then...
VERB: to spend
WORDS FORMED: spendings / expenditure / outgoings
COLLOCATIONS: money / fortune
Now, using this system (VERB - WORDS FORMED - COLLOCATIONS), let's look at the verbs from our previous blog post.
VERB: to cost-cost(s) [The cost of this TV is too much (=This TV is too expensive)]
COLLOCATIONS:
- [money] [The car cost £2,000. / My jacket cost only $20 in the sale.]
- a fortune [It costs a fortune to stay in that hotel.]
WORDS FORMED: - payment [The cost of this TV is too much (=This TV is too expensive)]COLLOCATIONS: [Because "pay" is the most general money-related verb, we can use it with almost anything. Many of these words will appear again with other collocations]
- a salary / a wage / a bonus [The company pays salaries/wages monthly. / There are many arguments over how much banks pay their employees in bonuses.]
- a fee / a price / a fortune [When you book a flight, you usually have to pay a hidden fee. / He paid a high price for his flat. / If she takes legal action, she'll have to pay a fortune to her lawyer.]
- tax / insurance [You'll be arrested unless you pay your tax. / I have to pay for my car insurance policy.]
VERB: to earnWORDS FORMED:
- earnings / income [Your income increases as you get older (=You earn more as you get older.)]
COLLOCATIONS:
- pay [This is an uncountable noun which is used generally to mean "the money which I was paid". For example, I earned my pay by working overtime.]
- a salary / a wage [Technically, there is a difference between these two words, but most people don't use it. The difference is that "a salary" is pay which is the same each month, and is measured by-the-year, whereas "wages" are paid by-the-hour. So an office worker would probably "earn a salary" but a barista in a café would probably "earn wages". More information here.
I earned a large salary when I worked in the marketing company. / He earns his wages in a supermarket.]
- a bonus [This is the money you earn for a specific reason (successful sales, Christmas-time) and it is paid once, not regularly like wages or a salary.I earned a huge bonus for meeting my sales targets this year! / The bonuses which bankers earn cause a lot of controversy in these difficult economic times.]
VERB: to save
WORDS FORMED:
- savings [I have enough savings to go travelling next year.]
COLLOCATIONS:
There are no collocations for this verb. The most common way to follow "save" is to describe how much money was saved. For example, I saved a little cash by shopping online or She saved £3,000 for her wedding.
WORDS FORMED:
- charge [The charge for this service is €20.]
COLLOCATIONS:
- a rate [The rate which they charge is a little expensive.]
- a fee [To fix my car, he charged me a fee of €200.]
- [an amount] [They'll charge you £50 if you cancel your flight.]
VERB: to make
WORDS FORMED:
There is no word-formation for this verb
COLLOCATIONS:
- money [This is the most general noun to use after the verb "to make". However, it's still used mostly in the business world (not in personal, everyday life). / He made money by betting on football matches. He made £200 in one day!]- a profit [this is the money which a company keeps after it has paid its expenses. It's an extremely important noun in the business world, and is always used with the verb "to make". / The company made a large profit last year. / How much profit do you expect to make in your campaign?]
- a loss [This is the opposite of "profit": when a business spends more money than it has made, we say the business has "made a loss". It sounds strange to use "make" with a negative word like "loss", but it is natural. / He made a loss on his stock-market deal.]
VERB: to raise
WORDS FORMED:
There is no word-formation for this verb
COLLOCATIONS:
- funds [We use the verb "to raise" only when we discuss charities and not-for-profit organisations. "Funds" is a noun which describes the money which these organisations make. In other words "funds" apply to charities, just as "profits" apply to businesses. (It's also good to remember that a common full-time job in charities is "Fundraiser". / The charity raised £2m in funds from their advertising campaign. / At Christmastime, many volunteers can be seen raising funds for charity.]
It is possible to use our new vocabulary (of Words-Formed and Collocations) to re-write the business report from the previous Business42 blog post. Remember that the full text, with answers can be found at the top of this page. However, let's look at it again and highlight the words/sentences which we can re-phrase. First, an example.
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined how much the company spends on external resources
...can be changed to...
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined the company's expenditure on external resources
(Remember that the second sentence isn't better or worse than the first sentence - it's just different. It's important for all English students to know the different ways to say the same thing.)
To practice this week's vocabulary, re-write the words/phrases in blue.
In today’s meeting, the Accounts team examined how much the company spends on external resources, such as suppliers, consultants and utilities (gas, electricity, etc.)The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) started the meeting by revealing that our company paid consultants over £2 million last year. Even though our company made £20 million in profit last year, the CFO said that we should try to spend less on consultants. We could save up to £2 million this year if we end our business with these consultants or if we ask them to charge less money for their services.Next, the Chief Accountant told us about how much money the company pays its employees. He told us that the average employee in our company earns £30,000 per year. Altogether, he said, employees cost the company around £500 million each year. The CFO announced that this was an acceptable amount of money to pay, so no changes will be made in this area.Lastly, the Chief Accountant’s assistant brought up the issue of how much money the company gives to the charity Amnesty International. This charity raised over £30 million last year; £1 million of this came from our company. The CFO and the Chief Accountant agreed that we should continue giving money to this charity.
Good luck, and keep practicing!
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