What has price

費 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 弗 (fú, "not / to brush away" — originally a pictograph of arrows being aside) on top + 貝 (cowrie shell / money) on the bottom. 弗 supplies the sound (fú → fèi) but also a hint of meaning: money being scattered or brushed away. The composite reads as "money dispersed away" = expenditure, expense, to consume. Curiously, both components have monetary associations: 貝 directly via cowrie shells, and 弗 has come to be used as the Sino-Asian phonetic transliteration of the dollar symbol $ in financial writing. Mainland simplified to 费.

Korean reading "bi." 費用 (biyong, expense — basic financial vocabulary), 消費 (sobi, consumption — economic term used in sobija "consumer"), 浪費 (nangbi, waste / wasteful spending), 經費 (gyeongbi, operating expenses — used in business and government budgets), 學費 (hakbi, tuition — major topic of Korean educational discourse), 會費 (hoebi, membership fee). Bi vocabulary saturates Korean economic and accounting language.

Mandarin fèi, 4th tone (simplified 费). 费 (fèi), 费用 (fèiyòng, expense), 消费 (xiāofèi, consumption), 浪费 (làngfèi, to waste), 学费 (xuéfèi, tuition), and the conversational 免费 (miǎnfèi, "exempt from cost" = free of charge — top-frequency adjective in Chinese commerce: 免费送货 free delivery, 免费试用 free trial). 免费 has become essential vocabulary in the Chinese e-commerce era.

Japanese on-reading ヒ (hi) — 費用 (hiyō, cost), 消費 (shōhi, consumption — used in 消費者 shōhisha "consumer"), 浪費 (rōhi, waste), 会費 (kaihi, membership fee), 経費 (keihi, operating expenses / business costs). Kun-reading ついやす (tsuiyasu, "to spend / consume / expend") — 費やす (tsuiyasu) — used metaphorically for spending not just money but time and effort: 時間を費やす (jikan o tsuiyasu, "to spend time / use up time on something"), 努力を費やす (doryoku o tsuiyasu, "to expend effort"). The verb retains a slightly formal, written-register feel.

Memory aid: money (貝) plus 弗 (scattering / not staying in place) — money dispersed away = expense.

値 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 亻 (person) + 直 (zhí, "straight / upright" — providing the sound). The composite reads as "what a person directly faces / encounters head-on" = value, worth, price. The etymological insight is philosophically interesting: value is conceived not as an inherent property of objects but as what a person stands face-to-face with — value emerges in the encounter. Mainland simplified slightly to 值.

Korean reading "chi." 價値 (gachi, value — the standard formal term, used widely in philosophy, economics, and ethics: gachigwan = "value system / worldview"), 近似値 (geunsachi, approximate value — math), 數値 (suchi, numerical value — used in statistics and engineering). Korean everyday "price / value" of an item leans on the native (gap), with 値 reserved for technical and abstract registers.

Mandarin zhí, 2nd tone (simplified 值). 值 (zhí, worth / value), 价值 (jiàzhí, value — abstract, philosophical), 数值 (shùzhí, numerical value), and especially 值得 (zhíde, "worth doing / worth it") — top-frequency expression in spoken Mandarin: 值得一看 (zhíde yī kàn, "worth seeing"), 不值得 (bù zhíde, "not worth it"). 值班 (zhíbān, to be on duty / on shift) is a separate semantic extension to "shift / duty."

Japanese on-reading チ (chi) — 価値 (kachi, value — abstract), 近似値 (kinjichi, approximation), 数値 (sūchi, numerical value — used in scientific and engineering contexts). Two kun-readings split formal-vs-everyday: あたい (atai, "value / worth" — literary register: 一見の値する eikken no atai suru "worth a look"); ね (ne, "price") — 値段 (nedan, "price-step" = price tag / price — the standard everyday Japanese word for price), 値上げ (neage, "price increase / price hike"), 値下げ (nesage, "price decrease / discount"). Japanese shopping vocabulary leans heavily on the kun-reading ne.

Memory aid: a person (亻) facing something straight on (直) — what one directly encounters and weighs = value.

益 is a beautifully visual compound ideograph: 水 (water, in its sideways stylized form on top) + 皿 (a dish / vessel — at the bottom). The composite picture is exactly water overflowing the rim of a dish — abundance spilling beyond capacity = gain, increase, benefit, profit. Originally 益 was the character now written 溢 (yì, "to overflow"); as the meaning specialized into "benefit / profit," a new character 溢 was created to retain the literal "overflow" sense, while 益 took the abstract meaning. This is a textbook case of semantic divergence creating two characters from one.

益 forms the canonical pair with 損 (loss): together they map gain and loss across financial, ethical, and ecological vocabulary.

Korean reading "ik." 利益 (iik, profit / benefit — top-frequency Korean noun), 有益 (yuik, beneficial), 無益 (muik, useless / not beneficial), 收益 (suik, revenue / income — accounting term), 公益 (gongik, public interest / common good — used in gong-ikgwanggo "public service announcement"), 益鳥 (ikjo, "beneficial bird" — birds that eat pest insects, contrasting with 害鳥 "harmful birds").

Mandarin yì, 4th tone. 益 (yì), 利益 (lìyì, benefit / interest — used in political and economic contexts: 国家利益 national interests), 收益 (shōuyì, earnings), 有益 (yǒuyì, beneficial), 益处 (yìchu, advantage), 受益 (shòuyì, "to receive benefit" = to gain benefit from). Modern Chinese keeps 益 in active formal-register use.

Japanese on-reading エキ (eki) — 利益 (rieki, profit — financial), 収益 (shūeki, earnings), 有益 (yūeki, beneficial). Alternative on-reading ヤク (yaku) appears notably in religious vocabulary: 御利益 (goriyaku, "honored benefit" = divine grace / blessing one receives from praying to a deity at a Shinto shrine or Buddhist temple). Japanese visitors to shrines pray for ご利益 — concrete blessings like good health, exam success, safe travel. The same character takes different on-readings depending on context: financial (rieki) vs spiritual (riyaku).

Memory aid: water (水) overflowing a dish (皿) — abundance spilling over the rim = profit. Pair with 損 (hand removing = loss).

富 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 宀 (the "roof / house" radical) + 畐 (fú, "full / brimming" — originally a pictograph of a wine vessel filled to the brim). The composite picture is wonderfully concrete: a house with vessels of wine and goods stocked full inside = wealth, prosperity. The character preserves the agrarian-era image of wealth as a well-stocked household pantry. The phonetic component 畐 also contributes a hint of meaning: "fullness."

富 forms the canonical pair with 貧 (poor) — fullness vs scattering — covering the entire economic spectrum.

Korean reading "bu." 富者 (buja, "rich person" — everyday Korean word for the wealthy), 富裕 (buyu, affluent / wealthy), 富國 (buguk, wealthy nation), 富强 (bugang, "rich and strong" — used in slogans about national power), 豊富 (pungbu, abundant / plentiful), 貧富 (binbu, "poor and rich" = wealth gap — major political topic in Korean discourse). Korean society discusses (binbu gyeokcha, "wealth gap") constantly.

Mandarin fù, 4th tone. 富 (fù), 富有 (fùyǒu, wealthy), 丰富 (fēngfù, abundant / rich — used metaphorically for emotionally rich, knowledge-rich, etc.: 经验丰富 jīngyàn fēngfù, "rich in experience"), 财富 (cáifù, wealth), 富翁 (fùwēng, "rich elder" = rich man / millionaire — 百万富翁 bǎiwàn fùwēng = millionaire). 丰富 is one of the most useful adjectives in Mandarin.

Japanese on-reading フ (fu) — 富裕 (fuyū, affluent), 富豪 (fugō, very wealthy person / tycoon), 豊富 (hōfu, abundant), 富国 (fukoku, wealthy nation — used in the Meiji-era slogan 富国強兵 fukoku kyōhei "rich country, strong military," which guided Japanese modernization). Alternative on-reading フウ (fū) — 富貴 (fūki, wealth and rank). Kun-readings: 富む (tomu, "to be rich in") — 知識に富む (chishiki ni tomu, "rich in knowledge"); 富 (tomi, wealth — noun). And the iconic mountain: 富士山 (Fujisan, Mt. Fuji — though the etymology of "Fuji" predates Japanese kanji writing, the chosen kanji 富士 conveys "wealth and warriors," elevating the mountain's name to symbolic majesty), 富山 (Toyama, "wealthy mountain" — Japanese prefecture).

Memory aid: a roof (宀) over a vessel brimming with wine (畐) — a household full of stored riches = wealth.

税 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 禾 (the "grain" radical, depicting a stalk of millet or rice with a drooping head) + 兌 (duì, "to exchange" — providing the sound). The composite is historically precise: in pre-monetary China, taxes were paid in grain, with farmers handing over a portion of their rice and millet harvest to the state. The character preserves an entire era of agrarian taxation when the harvest itself was the levy. All three CJK regions use the same form 税.

Korean reading "se." 稅金 (segeum, tax — top-frequency Korean noun in news and finance), 所得稅 (sodeukse, income tax), 稅務署 (semuso, tax office — Korea's Guksecheong National Tax Service is the agency, but local semuseo is the citizen-facing office), 課稅 (gwase, taxation / to levy tax), 免稅 (myeonse, duty-free), 消費稅 (sobise, consumption tax / VAT). Korean political vocabulary leans heavily on 稅 in budget debates and tax-reform discussions.

Mandarin shuì, 4th tone. 税 (shuì), 税收 (shuìshōu, tax revenue), 所得税 (suǒdéshuì, income tax), 免税 (miǎnshuì, tax-free), 税率 (shuìlǜ, tax rate). 增值税 (zēngzhíshuì, value-added tax) and 个人所得税 (gèrén suǒdéshuì, personal income tax) are basic Mandarin financial vocabulary.

Japanese on-reading ゼイ (zei) — 税金 (zeikin, tax — everyday word), 所得税 (shotokuzei, income tax), 消費税 (shōhizei, consumption tax — major Japanese political topic; raised from 8% to 10% in 2019, generating major economic and political debate), 税務署 (zeimusho, local tax office — every Japanese citizen interacts with this for annual filings), 免税店 (menzeiten, duty-free shop — keyword for tourist shopping in Japan; major brands like 関西国際空港免税店 anchor airport retail).

Memory aid: rice grain (禾) being exchanged (兌) — handing over a portion of harvest to the state = tax.

貨 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 化 (huà, "to transform / change") on top + 貝 (cowrie shell / ancient currency) on the bottom. The composite reads as "what gets exchanged using shells" = goods, merchandise, commodity. The 貝 (shell) radical preserves a deep historical memory: before metal coinage, ancient China used cowrie shells as currency. The shell radical anchors nearly every word for money, wealth, and exchange in CJK: 財 (wealth), 貨 (goods), 貯 (savings), 賃 (rent / wages), 買 (buy), 賣 (sell), 賞 (reward). All money-related vocabulary lives under the cowrie radical, even in our age of digital payments. Mainland simplified to 货.

Korean reading "hwa." 貨幣 (hwapye, currency — formal economic term), 財貨 (jaehwa, wealth / goods), 貨物 (hwamul, cargo / freight — used in shipping and aviation: hwamulseon = cargo ship), 百貨店 (baekhwajeom, "hundred-goods store" = department store — Korean shopping vocabulary), 硬貨 (gyeonghwa, "hard currency" = coin / specie). Korean economic and commercial discourse runs heavily on hwa vocabulary.

Mandarin huò, 4th tone (simplified 货). 货 (huò, goods), 货物 (huòwù, merchandise), 百货 (bǎihuò, "hundred-goods" = general merchandise / department-store goods — 百货公司 bǎihuò gōngsī = department store), 送货 (sònghuò, "to deliver goods" — keyword of modern Chinese e-commerce: every Taobao order tracks 送货 status), 货币 (huòbì, currency), 国货 (guóhuò, domestic goods — patriotic-consumption rhetoric), 假货 (jiǎhuò, counterfeit goods).

Japanese on-reading カ (ka) — 貨幣 (kahei, currency — formal/financial), 貨物 (kamotsu, cargo — used in 貨物列車 kamotsu ressha "freight train"), 百貨店 (hyakkaten, "hundred-goods store" = department store — Japanese term, often abbreviated to デパート depāto from English), 外貨 (gaika, "foreign currency" = foreign exchange), 硬貨 (kōka, hard currency / coin). Japan keeps 貨 strictly in the on-reading カ; there is essentially no kun-reading.

Memory aid: 化 (transform) + 貝 (cowrie shell) — what shells transform into through trade = goods. The cowrie shell radical 貝 marks all money words.

損 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 扌 (hand) + 員 (yuán, "personnel / round" — providing the sound). The composite reads as "to remove with the hand, to take away" = to reduce, damage, lose. 損 forms the canonical pair with 益 (yì, "to add / profit"): together they cover the financial balance sheet of gain and loss. Mainland simplified to 损.

Korean reading "son." 損失 (sonsil, loss — financial), 損害 (sonhae, damage — used both physically and legally: "compensation for damage"), 損益 (sonik, "loss-and-gain" = profit-and-loss; son-ikgyesanseo = income statement), 破損 (pason, breakage / damage), 缺損 (gyeolson, deficit / shortage). Korean accounting vocabulary leans heavily on this character.

Mandarin sǔn, 3rd tone (simplified 损). 损失 (sǔnshī, loss), 损害 (sǔnhài, damage / harm), 亏损 (kuīsǔn, "deficit-loss" = financial deficit / running in the red), 破损 (pòsǔn, broken / damaged). 受损 (shòusǔn, "to suffer loss") is the standard verb for "to be damaged."

Japanese on-reading ソン (son) — 損失 (sonshitsu, loss), 損害 (songai, damage), 破損 (hason, breakage), 損得 (sontoku, "loss-and-gain" — colloquial for "pros and cons"). And 損 alone, read son, is used as a casual noun: それは損だ (sore wa son da, "that's a bad deal / that's losing out"). Kun-reading そこなう (sokonau, "to spoil / damage / harm") — 損なう (sokonau), and the related そこねる (sokoneru, "to ruin / mess up") — 機嫌を損ねる (kigen o sokoneru, "to spoil someone's mood / put them in a bad mood"), 健康を損なう (kenkō o sokonau, "to harm one's health"). The verbs are formal-register equivalents of casual speech.

Memory aid: hand (扌) plus 員 (just the sound) — the hand removing / taking away = loss. Pair with 益 (water overflowing the bowl = gain).

The traditional 錢 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 金 (metal) + 戔 (jiān, "small / paired daggers" — providing the sound). The composite reads as "small metal piece used as currency" — coins. The etymology is precise: ancient Chinese coins were small round bronze pieces, and the metal radical 金 confirms their material composition. Three CJK regions diverged: traditional Korea retains 錢, Japan adopted shinjitai 銭, Mainland China simplified to 钱.

金 (metal) anchors the entire vocabulary of metalwork: 錢 (coin), 銀 (silver), 鋼 (steel), 鉄 (iron), 鏡 (mirror), 鍵 (key) — all related to forged or cast metal objects.

Korean reading "jeon." 金錢 (geumjeon, money — formal), 銅錢 (dongjeon, "copper-coin" = coin / coinage), 葉錢 (yeopjeon, the traditional Korean square-holed copper coin — a piece of cultural heritage now seen mostly in museums and historical drama props), 寸錢 (chonjeon, small change / petty money), 錢主 (jeonju, "money-master" = financial backer / investor — colloquial for someone who bankrolls a venture).

Mandarin qián, 2nd tone (simplified 钱). 钱 (qián) is one of the highest-frequency words in spoken Chinese — "money" is something Chinese speakers reference constantly. 钱包 (qiánbāo, wallet — "money-bag"), 有钱 (yǒuqián, "having money" = rich), 没钱 (méiqián, "no money" = broke), 赚钱 (zhuànqián, to earn money), 花钱 (huāqián, to spend money). Mandarin uses 钱 as a standalone everyday word, where Korean and Japanese prefer compounds.

Japanese on-reading セン (sen) — 金銭 (kinsen, money — formal). Kun-reading ぜに (zeni) — 銭 (zeni, old coin / archaic word for money). In modern Japan, the everyday word for money is お金 (okane) or 円 (en, "yen" — the currency unit); 銭 has become slightly old-fashioned. Critically, however, 銭湯 (sentō, "coin bath" = public bathhouse) remains a major cultural institution: Japanese sentō are public bath facilities where one pays a small fee (originally a few coins) to bathe communally. The word preserves the era of small-coin payment. Going to a sentō is a ritual of Japanese daily life, especially in older neighborhoods where private baths were less common.

Memory aid: metal (金) plus 戔 (small / paired) — small metal pieces = coins.

貧 is a compound ideograph: 分 (to divide / split) on top + 貝 (cowrie shell / money) on the bottom. The composite reads as "money divided up and scattered" = poverty, want, the absence of accumulated wealth. 貧 forms the perfect semantic mirror to 富 (wealth — a household full of vessels). Where 富 shows abundance gathered under a roof, 貧 shows resources fragmented and dispersed. Mainland simplified to 贫.

Korean reading "bin." 貧困 (binkkon, poverty — formal term used in academic and policy discourse), 貧富 (binbu, "poor and rich" = wealth gap), 貧血 (binhyeol, "poor blood" = anemia — medical term), 貧乏 (binpip, destitution), 淸貧 (cheongbin, "pure poverty" = honorable simplicity / voluntary poverty — a Confucian-Buddhist ideal of the principled scholar who refuses corruption even at the cost of comfortable living). (cheongbinhan seonbi) is a Korean cultural archetype of the morally pure intellectual.

Mandarin pín, 2nd tone (simplified 贫). 贫困 (pínkùn, poverty), 贫穷 (pínqióng, poor — basic adjective), 贫血 (pínxuè, anemia), and the politically loaded 脱贫 (tuōpín, "to escape poverty") — a major Chinese political slogan of the Xi Jinping era, with the 脱贫攻坚 ("battle to eliminate poverty") campaign declared successful in 2020 with the announcement that absolute rural poverty had been eliminated.

Japanese on-reading ヒン (hin) — 貧困 (hinkon, poverty), 貧富 (hinpu, wealth gap), 貧血 (hinketsu, anemia). Alternative on-reading ビン (bin) — 貧乏 (binbō, poverty — colloquial). Kun-reading まずしい (mazushii, "poor") — 貧しい (mazushii), 貧しさ (mazushisa, poverty — noun). And the wonderfully observed Japanese idiom: 貧乏ゆすり (binbō yusuri, "poor man's shake") — the unconscious habit of jiggling one's leg up and down while sitting. The Japanese folk explanation: poor people fidget because they are anxious about money, or because they cannot sit still trying to think of how to make ends meet. The expression has stuck even though the leg-bouncing habit is universal across socioeconomic classes.

Memory aid: money (貝) divided up and split apart (分) — fragmented wealth = poverty. Pair with 富 (full vessel under a roof = rich).

貯 is a phonetic-semantic compound: 貝 (cowrie shell / money — the wealth radical) + 宁 (zhù, originally a depiction of a box for stacking things — providing the sound). The composite literally means "money stacked in a box" = savings. The cowrie shell radical 貝 marks 貯 as part of the wealth-vocabulary family. Mainland China simplified to 贮.

Korean reading "jeo." 貯蓄 (jeochuk, savings — formal financial term), 貯金 (jeogeum, "stored money" = savings deposit / piggy bank money), 貯水池 (jeosuji, "stored-water pond" = reservoir — used for both literal water reservoirs and metaphorical "vote banks" in politics), 貯藏 (jeojang, storage / preservation — used for food storage: "kimchi storage").

Mandarin zhù, 4th tone (simplified 贮). Mandarin uses 贮 mainly for non-monetary storage: 贮藏 (zhùcáng, to store), 贮存 (zhùcún, to keep in storage). For "savings" specifically, modern Mandarin prefers 储 (chǔ): 储蓄 (chǔxù, savings), or the colloquial 存钱 (cúnqián, "deposit money / save money"). Same character 貯 across CJK, but Mandarin shifted the everyday vocabulary to a different morpheme — a clean example of how shared script can mask divergent usage.

Japanese on-reading チョ (cho) — 貯金 (chokin, savings deposit — the everyday Japanese word for putting money in a savings account, especially the postal savings system 郵便貯金 yūbin chokin), 貯蓄 (chochiku, savings), 貯水池 (chosuichi, reservoir). Kun-reading たくわえる (takuwaeru, "to store / accumulate / set aside") — 貯える (takuwaeru) — used for storing not just money but also strength, knowledge, supplies. The childhood 貯金箱 (chokinbako, "savings box" = piggy bank) in Japan often takes the form of beckoning cats, ceramic frogs, or the iconic Japanese country bank mascot tanuki figure.

Memory aid: cowrie shells / money (貝) stacked in a box (宁) — savings.