Learn English You NEED to Know: Key Phrases & Easy Listening Practice (Money)

money makes the world go around but have you ever  stopped to think about how money works and why we  

even use it more importantly can you talk about  money in English and use English phrases related  

to money with confidence this is one of the most  practical and fascinating topics to learn about  

and today I'm going to go through key words and  phrases related to money and also give you great  

listening practice so that you can learn a little  bit about the history of money in a way to help  

improve your English money isn't just something we  use every day it's a key Topic in everyday English  

conversations whether you're talking about your  salary how much you earn discussing the economy  

or simply budgeting for a trip knowing how  to talk about money in English is essential  

today I'll take you through the history of money  how it's created and the key terms and phrases  

you'll need for real life conversations about  spending saving earning and investing by the  

end of the episode you'll not only have a better  understanding of money but you'll also have the  

confidence to use phrases about naturally in  conversations so get yourself a drink or relax  

wherever you are or continue working out in the  gym and let's get started my name is Jack from To  

fluency this is the To fluency podcast and whether  you're watching on YouTube or listen on Spotify or  

apple podcasts I'm so glad you're here section one  is all about the evolution of money so we're going  

to give a brief history of this and then talk  about some of the key phrases that you can use  

and then also some speaking and listening practice  now before money existed like we know it today  

people traded goods and services directly and this  was called a barter system a barter system now you  

can barter with somebody in order to exchange  goods or services for example you can imagine  

in England a thousand years ago someone might  trade some wheat for a goat so they say I have  

this wheat can I exchange it for your goat but  bartering had its problems because what if the  

person with the goat didn't want wheat they didn't  need this wheat that is where money came in and  

the first forms of money were coins made out of  precious metals for example gold and silver now  

here is a key phrase these Metals had intrinsic  value intrinsic value meaning their worth came  

from the material itself the gold and silver  after that came paper money which was easier  

to carry but relied on trust the value was backed  by governments or Banks to be backed by something  

means that the paper money could be exchanged  for the gold amount that it says on that paper  

so even though people had paper money they  still could exchange this for gold but now  

paper money is backed by governments or Banks and  today everything is more or less digital and we  

also have digital currencies like Bitcoin so some  key phrases here if you want to talk about this  

are barter systems were one of the earliest forms  of trade barter systems were one of the earliest  

forms of trade paper money replace coins paper  money replace coins and cryptocurrencies are a  

new form of digital money next we're going to talk  about the dollar versus gold how money works and  

how it is created and then we're going to have  some very specific English phrases related to  

money so next dollar versus gold like we mentioned  before for thousands of years gold was considered  

the ultimate store of value and this is because it  had intrinsic value it's durable which means it's  

tough Limited in Supply which means there's  only so much of it and very importantly it  

is universally recognized so people all around  the world considered gold to be important but  

most modern currencies like the dollar the pound  and the Euro aren't bed by gold anymore instead  

they are called Fiat money Fiat so think of the  dollar today as Fiat money and what's interesting  

is Fiat money has value because the government  says it does and people trust it so think about  

the US dollar it's just a a piece of paper or  a number on a screen it's simply a number on a  

screen but we trust it because we know we can  use it to buy things we can exchange it for  

goods and services so when you talk about money in  English you might hear people debating or arguing  

talking about whether Fiat money is reliable or  if we should return to a gold standard where the  

money is backed by gold so understanding these  terms will help you joining these conversations  

next we're going to briefly talk about how money  works and how it is created so modern money isn't  

just printed which means it's not just created in  today's system we have a debt based system a debt  

based system and debt is spelled DEBT but we just  say debt debt and debt is something that is owed  

to somebody else so the system the monetary system  today is all about debt and in fact modern money  

is largely created through lending now I'm  sure in English classes in the past you've  

learned the difference between lend and borrow  so to lend someone something means that you give  

them something but you expect it back and it  can be used with money so Banks can lend money  

you can even use the term loan which means that  they are giving money to somebody and they want  

it back however what's interesting and not a lot  of people know this is that when somebody takes  

out a loan at the bank the bank doesn't give  that person existing money instead it creates  

new money by entering the loan amount into  your account and this is called debt based  

money debt-based money now this system relies on  trust it relies on trust a great verb to rely on  

something so you promise or the person promises to  pay back the loan and that promise gives the money  

value and most of the money in circulation most  of the money in the world today is created this  

way not as physical cash but as numbers in bank  accounts a couple of key phraes here are central  

banks control the money supply by setting policies  now that's quite a complex sentence probably for a  

lot of people listening to this if it's easy for  you that's great but it's central banks control  

the money supply how much money is in the economy  by setting policies and interest rates determine  

the cost of borrowing money so if interest rates  are low the percentage of money you have to pay  

back on your loan if these interest rates are  low then more people want to borrow money but  

if the interest rates are high then fewer people  want to borrow money so that's an overview of the  

evolution of money dollar versus gold and how  money works and how it is created let's now  

talk about spending money and talk about some  common Expressions you can use in English when  

you're going to spend your money the first one is  this blow money and this means to spend money care  

lessly it means you don't have a budget you don't  think about oh should I spend this or should I not  

spend this instead you blow your money which may  means you spend it all carelessly for example my  

friend blew all of his money on a new car I could  say my friend spent all of his money on a new car  

but by using the word blow it means it wasn't a  good decision he blew all his money on a new car  

now I'll leave all the phrases that we talk about  today in the description below the next one is  

tighten up tighten up this means to reduce your  spending so you can imagine that you went on a  

great vacation you spent a lot of money you come  back and you say I need to tighten up after our  

vacation I need to tighten up after our vacation  the next one is to splur splurge on something to  

splurge on something and this means to spend  extravagantly to spend a lot of money and to  

enjoy that process and it usually means you're  going to spend more money than you should or  

more money than you have to for example I feel  like splurging on a new sound system so I know  

I shouldn't spend too much money on it but I just  feel like splurging I feel like spending a lot of  

money going extravagant and buying an expensive  sound system now in real life when you're going  

to talk about spending money you can think about  your spending habits and create sentences to  

describe them so are you somebody who blows  money and things you don't need or do you try  

to tighten up after a trip and what was the last  thing you splurged on so practice creating these  

phrases and sentences yourself use episode 53 to  help you practice that I'll leave a link in the  

description where I talk about how to use AI  to create new sentences that are personal to  

you now we've talked about spending money let's  now talk about saving money and saving money is  

another important part of having these Financial  conversations in English so you can sound more  

natural so I have three phrases for for you the  first one is to put money aside to put money aside  

and this means to save for a specific purpose for  example I'm putting money aside for a new car I  

am putting money aside for a new car the next one  is Nest egg Nest Egg nest and then egg and this  

refers to money saved for the future especially  for when you're older for when you want to retire  

for example you might say about your friends  they've built a nice nest egg over the years  

they've built a nice Nest EG over the years and  then this is one you might have heard before to  

save for a rainy day to save for a rainy day and  this means to save for emergencies it's an idiom  

because we're not actually saving money for when  it rains but it means to save for emergencies for  

example it's always wise to save for a rainy  day it's always wise to save for a rainy day  

now are you somebody who likes to save money for  the future and are you putting aside money for  

anything in particular right now these are the  type of things you can think about when you're  

talking in English about money now the next one is  quite similar to save but it's different and you  

understand why in a second it is investing okay  so we can talk about some investing money phrases  

and investing is all about putting your money to  work to earn more money so you invest in a stock  

or you invest in real estate or Bonds in the hope  that it will grow in value over time time because  

when you save money in the bank account a lot of  the time in your regular bank account you don't  

get interest if you have a savings account you get  interest but to buy things like stocks or crypto  

currencies or real estate this is called investing  so there are some key terms here stocks stocks  

these are the shares of ownership in a company  for example I invested in tech stocks last year  

I invested in tech stocks last year and the next  one is portfolio portfolio this is a collection of  

Investments for example you might hear people say  it's important to have a balanced portfolio it's  

important to have a balanced portfolio where it  has different stocks different cryptocurrencies  

for example and it's balanced now some everyday  phrases about investing are don't put all your  

eggs in one basket don't put all your eggs in  one basket now you might hear this in terms of  

everything in everyday life it's quite common in  everyday English and it means that don't put all  

of your money into one stock because if you do  that and that stock fails you have lost all your  

money so what it's saying here is to spread your  Investments to reduce risk that's what that phrase  

means you might hear somebody say I'm going to  play it safe I'm going to play it safe which  

means you're going to choose low-risk Investments  and the opposite of that is to take a gamble I'm  

going to take a gamble invest in something risky  which means it could fail or it could give you  

high returns it's going to be a good investment  if it works out but a terrible investment if it  

doesn't now when we're talking about investing we  can use some conditionals here for example if I  

had more money I would invest it in real estate  if I had more money I would invest it in real  

estate or if I had more money I would buy more  Bitcoin now I've got three more topics to talk  

about um the last one is everyday money idms and  expressions but first we're going to talk about  

debt and Loans so I'll talk about this a little  bit more quickly as we talked about debt before  

now we mentioned interest rate before which is  really important and this is the cost of borrowing  

money usually a percentage but one specific  term that's important to know is a mortgage  

and listen to the spelling of this m o r t g a g  e Mort gaug but we say mortgage mortgage mortgage  

and this is a loan specific to buying property  for example example most people have to take  

out a mortgage in order to buy a house now here  are three everyday phrases about debt the first  

one is to pay off so to pay off a loan means to  completely repay that loan so for example people  

might pay off their credit card debt which means  they pay off all the debt for the credit card and  

maybe things are working well for you when you  say I'm going to pay off my car loan today I'm  

going to pay off my car loan another one is to be  drowning in debt drowning in debt and you probably  

know that this is a negative term and it means to  be overwhelmed by debt to have so much debt that  

you feel overwhelmed for example we're drowning  in debt since Paul lost his job we're drowning in  

debt since Paul lost his job now the next area  is a Hot Topic in many different countries and  

it's this talking about inflation and Rising  costs talking about inflation and Rising costs  

now inflation is simply the rise in prices over  time which means that the value of money decreases  

and it's important because it affects everyone  it changes how much you pay for groceries rent  

and even big purchases like cars and homes and  it's been a big Topic in the news recently so  

it's important to understand this so here are  some key terms and phrases firstly inflation so  

again this is the increase in prices over time for  example you might hear someone say inflation has  

caused prices to go up significantly this year the  next one is cost of living the cost of living and  

this is the amount of money needed to sustain a  standard of living for example the cost of living  

is rising in many cities at the moment or it's  important to think about the cost of living if  

you're going to move to a new city or country  now this is more of an everyday phrase more  

conversational someone might say prices are going  through the roof prices are going through the  

roof which means that prices are rising quickly an  example might be gas prices are going through the  

roof and another one you might hear people say is  I can't afford to eat out anymore I can't afford  

to eat out anymore and this is because the prices  in restaurants have increased so much that that  

person doesn't have enough money or they don't  have enough in their budget to eat at restaurants  

so to eat out means to eat at restaurants you're  almost there let's continue with the last one and  

this is everyday money idioms and expressions and  the these are fun ones too so English has so many  

IDs about money these are some of the best ones  now the first one is something you might hear a  

parent say to their child and it's this money  doesn't grow on trees money doesn't grow on  

trees it means that money is limited the amount  of money that that parent has is limited so they  

need to spend it wisely the next one is to make  a killing make a killing and this means to earn a  

lot of money for example he made a killing in real  estate last year he made a killing in real estate  

last year or he made a killing in the stock market  recently he made a killing in the stock market  

recently and did you notice the intonation and  stress with that one the next one which I really  

like is to throw money down the drain to throw  money down the drain this means to waste money  

for example buying that car was like throwing  money down the drain buying that car was like  

throwing money down the drain so we've covered  quite a lot in this episode and hopefully you  

have found it useful what I highly recommend  you do now is go to the description and read  

the sentences the phrases and the idioms that we  have talked about in this lesson that way you'll  

be able to practice these phrases and then create  sentences either by yourself or with using AI or  

with a teacher that are very specific to you in  this area that's going to help you use the correct  

type of English and make it specific to you then  continue listening with me on this podcast I have  

many different episodes here so listen to some  old ones to some newer ones whichever ones that  

you think are going to help you if you're watching  on YouTube there are hundreds of videos here so  

again just go through the channel and take more  English lessons with me and then one last thing  

if you found this useful then share this video  or episode with a friend send it via WhatsApp  

and tell them to check it out thanks again for  being here and I'll speak you soon bye for now