Meaning & use
debt
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Meanings
nouncountable or uncountable
An amount of money that a person, company, or country has borrowed and still has to pay back.
Grammar: Countable for a particular sum (a debt of $500), uncountable for the general state of owing (she hates being in debt).
Patterns
- owe a debt to someone
- be in debt
- pay off a debt
He took a second job to pay off his credit card debt.
The company collapsed under the weight of its debts.
Many students leave university with a large debt.
nouncountablefigurative
A feeling of obligation to someone who has helped you, which you feel you should repay with thanks or a favor.
Grammar: Usually appears in the pattern a debt to someone or a debt of gratitude.
Patterns
- owe someone a debt of gratitude
- a debt to someone
I owe my old teacher a huge debt for believing in me.
The whole village is in her debt after she organized the flood relief.
Modern jazz owes a debt to the blues.
Word forms
| plural | debts |
|---|
Common combinations
- pay off a debt
- They finally paid off the debt on their car.
- run up debts
- She ran up debts of several thousand dollars during her first year away.
- in debt
- After the wedding they were deeply in debt.
- bad debt
- The bank wrote off millions in bad debt last quarter.
- a debt of gratitude
- The team owes a debt of gratitude to its volunteers.
- national debt
- The national debt has grown for ten years in a row.
Synonyms and how they differ
- liability
- Liability is a broader accounting term for anything a business owes, while debt is the everyday word for borrowed money.
- arrears
- Arrears means payments that are overdue, so it is narrower than debt, which includes money not yet due.
- obligation
- Obligation covers any duty, not necessarily money, so it is vaguer than debt.
Opposites
Word family
- debtor noun
- a person or organization that owes money
- indebted adjective
- owing money or thanks to someone
- indebtedness noun
- the state of owing money or being obliged
- debit noun
- an entry recording money taken out of an account
Commonly confused: debt or deficit?
debt vs deficit
A deficit is the shortfall when spending exceeds income in a period, while debt is the total amount owed. A country can run a deficit this year and still have an older debt.
Practice
After years of overspending, the family was heavily in ____ and could barely cover the interest.
Choose one answer.
Be in debt means to owe money. Credit, surplus and profit all describe having money, so they contradict the idea of struggling with interest.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “debt”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.