This is an All Ears English Podcast, episode 2402. Should you call someone cheap in English? Welcome to the All Ears English Podcast, downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, knowledge, Not perfection with your American host. Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz, and Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, USA.
And to get your transcripts delivered by email every week, go to allearsenglish.com forward slash subscribe. Have you heard that money is a taboo topic in English? Sometimes it is, but we do talk about money in certain ways. Today, get six new vocabulary terms and learn what we do say about our spending habits. Hey there, Aubrey. How are you today? I'm great, Lindsay. Question for you. Are you a saver or a spender?
I'm not really much of a spender. Like, I don't go shopping. I don't buy clothes. So I end up just kind of saving because I'm not really that interested in buying stuff. But I will spend money on experiences. right yeah right it depends on what it is i'm not a shopper so i think often when people think about this question save or spender we think about shopping like um do i buy frivolously but when it comes to travel or maybe like
dining. Sometimes I do like to go to a nice restaurant and then maybe I am more of a spender than a saver. I like it too. I like to go to nice restaurants because I want the experience. I want a glass of wine. I want a nice meal. I want to socialize with friends. You know, you're getting so much more when you're investing in experiences. So this is a great, what are we getting into today, Opry? So this was one of the questions, the conversation starters in Open Conversation Club last week.
And it sparked a really interesting conversation because we were talking about cheap, a person being described as cheap and the difference between that and frugal. And they were asking, what is the opposite of cheap? And, you know, everyone was Googling it and seeing all of these words that the internet was giving us. I'm like, that doesn't really mean the opposite of cheap. So we want to share that vocabulary today that was so fascinating.
So that you guys, because this is interesting to, it's an interesting way to connect, to describe yourself, your spending habits and those people that you know. Yeah, and it's important to be clear, especially if we're describing other people, to be clear for sure. So guys, if you're wondering what OCC is, Open Conversation Club, this is a special bonus.
For listeners and students in our courses, you get invited to come and practice conversation with us, with other students in small groups and large groups. at Open Conversation Club when you join one of our courses. And they're every week, sometimes twice a week. It is so fun, great conversations, excellent opportunities to meet speaking partners and practice speaking English and with us.
The host of Oliver's English. It is so fun. I look forward to it every week. It's really cool. Like this week I was able to do two or three hot seats where I pulled one lucky student out of the break room to speak with me. It's a really cool benefit, right? To be in our courses. We love getting to know you, right? That's one of the downsides of podcasting. We don't get to know you, our listeners, as much as we'd like.
It's always so exciting for us when you are in one of our courses and get to come to these live speaking events. Amazing. Aubrey, let's get into just defining some key terms. Because this does say a lot about lifestyle, about values. What is the most important word for today that we're talking about in the episode? So first is the word cheap, which means there are different meanings, right? If you're describing a thing as cheap, it means inexpensive.
that's not what we're talking about today we're talking about when you describe a person as cheap which means stingy miserly these are also words they don't like to spend money often at the risk of looking bad right of looking um losing face is what we will say sometimes this is an idiom um This has a very negative connotation. I would not want someone to call me cheap. What about you, Lynn?
Absolutely not. You want to avoid that at all costs. I know that within my partner's social circle, my partner's sister had a friend and somehow this guy's name was Let's call him Dan. It's not his real name. But he got the label Cheap Dan. Oh, no. What happened? What did he do? How did he get that label? He's called Cheap Dan. Are we going to invite Cheap Dan today? He probably never paid for his own meal, right? He goes, oh, I forgot my wallet. Cheap down always forgets his wallet.
Maybe he's revised his ways, but you do not want that label for sure. So that it was interesting because I was sharing with them this other vocabulary we're going to share because I don't like saving money. But I consider myself to be a frugal person. This does not have the negative connotation that cheap has. In some ways, in practical application, it might look the same sometimes, right?
Someone might say that I'm too cheap to buy a lot of new clothes. I would say that I'm frugal. This means sparing or economical with money. Right. It's the weird thing about money. It means something different for everyone, right? It means different things. People see it with a different lens. So they might see you as cheap because you don't buy new clothes, but you see it as strategic spending, right? You want to spend that money on something different.
right exactly i just think i'm wise with money right i'm gone i There are things that I will, like you said, with travel, I'm not as frugal when it comes to travel. I might want to stay in a nicer hotel or fly first class. We'll see. But when it comes to like clothing, I'm very frugal.
Or just book that extra trip, the third trip of the year, right? You want to book that trip and not stay home. I do want to mention something about the word miserly, because when I look at it, the pronunciation is miserly. But for our listeners, if you have the transcripts today... It looks like. The beginning of miserable or commiserate. It feels like it should be miserly but it's not.
That's true. This is interesting. The word miser as a noun, spelled M-I-S-E-R, is a person who is cheap. I think of Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. He is called in that Charles Dickens book a miser because he... is not generous. He won't spend money both on himself and on others. And this adjective, you're right, is spelled M-I-S-E-R-L-Y. Hopefully you guys have the transcripts. It's not really pronounced the way you would expect.
I love it. So good to know. So we got that sample sentence. Are we ready for number two, frugal, Aubrey? Yeah, we did frugal, right? I shared this very economical, but the next one is thrifty. What does thrifty mean, Lindsay? Well, it's the name of a rental car company that I can think of, but an ice cream place. There are thrifty ice cream places in Mexico all over the place. Oh, interesting. It is using money and other resources carefully and not wastefully.
So he's always been thrifty, or she's really thrifty in men's torn clothing. rather than throwing it out. Yeah. Right. So if you shop at thrift stores, someone might say you're thrifty, right? You don't mind thrifting is the verb. Like you are willing to try and repurpose clothing or other items rather than just throwing it away and buying new.
And a lot of this has to do with our generation. Like, I know my mom's mom was around in the Great Depression, and I'm sure you do, right? So her mom used to say... we used to save rubber bands i mean i save everything plastic bags there was no throwing out so my mom when i was growing up she would always sew our clothing for us instead of just throwing it out but i think now i mean i'll speak for myself like it's a throwing out generation right we just kind of
I don't know how to sew. That has not been carried. She tried to teach me how to sew and I just was not interested. And it was lost with me because my mom taught me how to mend, how to sew. I can sew. I can make clothing. I can use a sewing machine, but I have not passed that on to my children. I don't necessarily have the patience and they have no interest. So they now are probably not going to mend. They can like stitch a little hole, but most of the time they're just going to get rid of it.
It's just what we've been through. What are the big shockwaves that have been set through the economy as we've been in our formative years? That's what determines a lot of times how we deal with money, right? Yes. Interesting. And now time is money. They're like, I don't want to take the time to fix that. I'm going to throw it out. Buy something. Right, right, right. So Aubrey, what would you say then? I'll just ask you the question. What's the opposite of cheap?
Yeah, so this was really interesting. Students in Open Conversation Club asked this. And I had to think about it a second, and we were Googling, and online, the results you will get will say generous, liberal, charitable, bountiful, open-handed, all of these adjectives. What is the opposite of cheap? None of these are correct. because the word cheap has such a negative connotation of being stingy.
And there really isn't a word that means the opposite of that. We would just say not cheap. Is he cheap? No, he's not cheap. And so it's interesting because this does happen in English and in every language. that sometimes there isn't a really direct opposite, especially for something that has a connotation, like this negative connotation. Sometimes the opposite is just not.
that whatever it is not something sometimes that's true i mean the word generous is close but it doesn't necessarily mean exactly the opposite right But what are some sample sentences here, Aubrey? Yeah. So for example, he's not cheap. He always pays for his meal when we go out or they're not cheap. They always tip generously. But it's interesting because
I agree. Generous is similar, right? That means to give more of something than is necessary or expected. Time, money. So the opposite of like someone who doesn't tip servers could be called cheap. And then maybe someone who does. tip a lot would be called generous But this can exist in the same person. Someone that you might call cheap could be very generous in other ways, right? Right. So that's why, I mean, humans are not simple. I've learned anything in the last few years. Yes.
People are extremely contradicting of themselves in their actions. Everyone is. And we all have our weird contradictions and idiosyncrasies, right? So that is absolutely true. But you might just use it, talk about the situation itself. Like he's a good tipper. right in that exact situation you might say he's not cheap he's a good tipper
Exactly, right. But often, I think it's important to... to think about this that when you're looking for opposites in English, you are going to get, you know, if you look at the thesaurus, you look at all of these adjectives, they all will have a specific meaning.
They all have these slightly different meanings and you can't just assume that they all mean the exact opposite because so many words have these implications, have these connotations. So if you call someone cheap, that's actually quite rude and offensive. And if it's true, okay. But if not, you could really, I would hate to be called chief.
Yeah, like I always said at the top of the show, my sister-in-law would never call Cheap Dan, Cheap Dan to his face, right? Cheap Dan, right, to party. Glad you're here. No, right. It's just too mean. And often people who are cheap don't realize it about themselves. They would probably call themselves frugal. You know, they think of themselves as frugal. So this is really interesting. But if you were to need the opposite, if someone asks you like, oh, is that guy cheap?
and you want to say that he's not, you would just say, no, he's not cheap. I agree. Yeah, I think that's a good way to put it. I love it. And then the word lavish. Yeah, so these came up too. Both lavish and extravagant came up as when we're looking for the opposite of stingy. This means more like spending money freely. And we often use it to describe like
parties, restaurants, the ballroom is so lavish. You know, the chandelier is gigantic or extravagant meals. Like, wow, that 12 course meal was extravagant. It means like a lot of money was spent freely on it. I wouldn't use either of these as the opposite of cheap. If someone's not cheap, I wouldn't say, no, they're lavish, they're extravagant. So it's really tricky. You just can't always trust the internet. If they gave the internet, they gave this as the opposite. And I beg to differ.
Yeah, we did an episode over on IELTS Energy about staying away, being careful with forums. When we're asking questions, you need context. Today we're giving you the context, right? It's all about context. Love it.
Okay, Aubrey, let's dive into a role play to make this super clear for our listeners. All right, you and I are discussing our friends' spending habits in this role play. I'll start a second. All right, here we go. I don't want to call Mark cheap, but I think he's pretty low to spend his money.
Yeah, I get that impression. I'm frugal, but I try not to be cheap. Same. Especially when it comes to clothes. I've always been thrifty. Travel, too. I try to find budget flights and hotels. You're a generous person. You'd pay every time we go to lunch if I let you. Nice. I love this bonus, loathe. It means like reluctant or unwilling, and we will just use it conversationally like this, but it's a little less common. I think it's very high level, actually. I agree.
Super high level, like C1, B2, C1 level. But if our listeners, if you guys can put that into your speech, it's a marker of just sophisticated speaking. And use it in this chunk. Someone is loathe to do something else. She is loathe to walk into a haunted house. Just means unwilling. Mm-hmm. 100%. I love that. So let's go through it, Aubrey. So first you said, I don't want to call Mark cheap, but I think he's pretty loathe to spend money.
Yeah, this is me like nicely saying I've noticed we have a friend that's cheap. I recognize that that's not a kind thing to say. So I'm sort of trying to say it in a nicer way. Yeah, exactly. But you're still trying to say it, right? You want to express that in some way. And then you say, I'm frugal, but I try not to be cheap. And you can see that, right? Frugal means I'm careful with my money.
I'm not spending extravagantly, but I try not to be cheap. I try not to do things that would give this negative impression of me. Right, exactly, exactly. And then we use the word thrifty, same, especially when it comes to clothes. I've always been thrifty, right? Thrifty, meaning you've always been, it's very similar to frugal.
Pretty much the same thing, would you say? It's a little different because I don't feel like you can use thrifty when it comes to maybe travel or food. I wouldn't be like, I'm thrifty with my spending at restaurants. I feel like it's more about repurposing things.
So like clothing, if we're trying to mend clothing instead of buying new clothing, we would say thrifty. Resourcefulness. Resourceful, if you're resourceful. But I do feel like in general, we'll call someone thrifty who's just good at saving money. Got it. Love it. And then I said, you're a generous person. You'd pay every time we go to lunch if I let you.
And this is that very complimentary adjective, right? It means to give more of something than necessary or expected. We all have those friends who are so generous. We almost have to insist to pay because they're always trying to pay, trying to be very generous. Yeah, for sure.
And everyone has different ideas about money. It's really interesting. This kind of interfaces too with the cultural value that Americans don't talk about money, but we do. We do talk about money, right? It's just that we talk about it in certain ways. Exactly, right? There are certain subjects we avoid and certain vocabulary we avoid, right? It's interesting, certain subjects we really stay away from.
This is a perfectly viable conversation. So when we say these are the four topics, you know, money, sex, religion, politics, that's not necessarily true. We have to look at the nuances of how we talk about. Exactly, right? We might talk about a friend that's cheap.
But we certainly, the person we're telling that to, we certainly wouldn't ask them like how much they make. There are certain things that are so taboo that we would avoid asking. That's really interesting. It's like the fine lines of how, where do you go too far? Aubrey, is that the takeaway for today or is there anything else we need to know?
I do think that's it. I mean, first of all, there are, and we talk about this a lot, we try to point out these pitfalls in English, words that you might not realize have a negative connotation to help you avoid giving offense without meaning to. cheap is one of them, right? I would definitely never call anyone cheap to their face. If you think they're cheap, that might be something you say to a friend like,
maybe we don't invite them to lunch. Yeah, I love it. I love it. And guys, if you love our style of looking for human connection in every language point, how can you connect in any English speaking situation? then hit the follow button right here on the show so you don't miss a single episode. Right, Aubrey? Yes, absolutely. Awesome. Fun episode today, Lindsay. Yeah, good stuff, good stuff. We'll talk to you very soon. All right. See you next time. All right, take care. Bye.
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