Learn the English Phrases DOWN THE DRAIN and GOING UNDER - A Short English Lesson with Subtitles

So today I wanted to help you learn the English phrase

down the drain.

When we say in English that something

is going down the drain,

it means that things are getting worse.

If I was to say that a business is going down the drain,

it means that the business isn't making money.

The business doesn't have very many customers.

The business is going down the drain.

And just to remind you, the drain is the thing

that you find at the bottom of a sink.

When you turn on a tap or a faucet,

the water goes down the drain.

So we use the same phrase to describe things

that are going badly.

You can also say that a relationship

is going down the drain.

If the two people in the relationship don't get along,

you could say it's going down the drain.

And then we have another little phrase

when we think people are spending money

and not in a good way,

we say that it's like pouring money down the drain.

So instead of keeping the money or saving it,

you're actually spending it unwisely.

Anyways, I wanted to end by thanking Elena

for the suggestion.

Awesome, thanks for the e-mail.

I also want to talk about the phrase going under.

When a business isn't doing well,

when a business is spending more money than they are making,

we would say that the business is going under.

Another English word for it

is that a business can be going bankrupt.

So when you say that a business,

when the business is going down the drain,

you could also say that the business is going under,

which means that the business is going bankrupt,

and eventually the business will have to close

because they won't have enough money to operate.

So when things are going down the drain,

they're getting worse.

Thanks again, Elena for the suggestion.

And then when you say that a business is going under,

it means that the business is not doing very well.

I'm not sure what just happened with my voice there.

Apparently my voice is going down the drain a little bit.

Anyways, Bob the Canadian here.

Hope you're having a good day and I'll see you tomorrow

with another short English lesson.