October 21, 2013 06:01 UTC
Audio / Words and Their Stories
Money Talks
I’m Susan Clark with Words and Their Stories, aprogram in Special English on the Voice of America.
People often say that money talks. They mean that aperson with a lot of money can say how he or shewants things done. But it is not easy to earn enoughmoney to gain this kind of power.
Nobody is sure how the word got started. But it beganto appear in American newspapers in the eighteenhundreds. A newspaper in Boston, Massachusetts saidthe word came from a criminal whose name wasBorghese. The newspaper said Borghese wrotechecks to people although he did not have enoughmoney in the bank. After he wrote the checks, he wouldflee from town. So, people who were paid with hischecks received nothing. The newspaper saidAmericans shortened and changed the criminal's nameBorghese, to bogus.
People trying to earn money also must be aware of being ripped off. A personwho is ripped off has had something stolen, or at least has been treated veryunfairly.
A writer for the magazine “American Speech” said he first saw the expressionused in 1971. It was on a sign that a student carried during a protestdemonstration at a university. The message on the sign was that the studentfelt ripped off, or cheated.
Perhaps the best way to prevent getting ripped off in business is to not try toget rich quickly. To be successful, a person in business works hard and triesto get down to brass tacks.
This expression means to get to the bottom or most important part ofsomething. For example, a salesman may talk and talk about his productwithout saying the price. You get down to brass tacks when you say, “itsounds good, but how much does it cost?”
Word expert Charles Funk thinks the expression comes from sailors on ships.They clean the bottom of a boat. When they have removed all the dirt, they aredown to the brass tacks, the copper pieces that hold the boat together.
So, if we get down to brass tacks, we can prevent ripoffs and bogus ways ofearning money in that jungle out there. And, some good luck will help, too.
This Words and Their Stories was written by Jeri Watson. I’m Susan Clark.
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