English Vocabulary: Stingy vs Frugal

Hello, everyone. My name is Robin. 

And in this video, I'm going to talk about  two expressions that describe how people use, 

or control money. One is positive. 

And one is negative. All right. 

So these two adjectives, the first one,  we're going to talk about, is ‘stingy’. 

Okay. Now, let's focus on the pronunciation first. 

‘stingy’ A lot of my students mistakenly say ‘stingee’. 

Okay. You got to be very careful. 

It is pronounced ‘stingy’. And what does stingy mean? 

Well, someone who is stingy -  they don't like to spend money. 

They don't like to share money. Okay. 

They are very greedy. They are not generous. 

They are exactly like Scrooge. You may have, you may have heard,  

or know about Scrooge. He is a very stingy guy. 

He does not want to share any of his money. All right, so, to help us understand stingy  

a little bit better, let's look  at a few example sentences. 

Okay. So the first example for stingy. 

He doesn't want to give his  son bus money. He is stingy. 

Alright, so, yeah, this father doesn't  want to give his son any bus money. 

Okay. That's a very stingy guy. Let's look at the next example. 

I was so thirsty, but my sister  wouldn't buy me water. She's stingy. 

Okay, again, my sister very bad. I'm so thirsty, but she wouldn't  

buy me even water. Yeah, she's very stingy. 

Okay. So we just saw some examples of stingy. 

I hope you are not stingy. It's a very negative word to call someone. 

But there is a positive word. And that's our next word. 

That word is ‘frugal’. Listen to the pronunciation. 

‘frugal’ Okay, so a person who is frugal,  

they don't like to waste money. All right. 

They like to save money or keep their  money and control their money very well. 

So for example, someone goes to the  market to buy some items or some things. 

They’re probably going to buy the cheaper items. Okay. 

They don't like to waste money on  brand names or expensive items. 

Okay. 

So people who like to spend less money  for things to save money they are frugal. 

All right. So let's take a look at a few  

examples to understand frugal. Okay. 

Let's look at the first example for frugal. My father usually takes the bus to work  

instead of driving. He is frugal. So, yeah, the father takes the bus  

instead of driving, so he's probably  saving money on the oil price. 

He's a very frugal guy. Let's look at the next example. 

My sister always uses coupons when she  buys something at the store. She is frugal. 

Okay. So she's always using coupons to save money. 

She's very frugal. Alright. 

So those were the examples of frugal. Okay. 

So again, ‘stingy’ is negative. So if you say to someone, “Oh you  

are stingy.” Okay, it's a very negative thing. That person doesn't want to share their money. 

They just want to keep their money. But on the other hand, if you say to  

someone, “Oh, you are quite frugal.”  Okay, that's kind of a compliment. 

Meaning they are good at controlling  their money and not wasting money. 

All right. So that's it and see you next time.