Pay off
It’s been weeks since we’ve picked a phrasal verb. Not on purpose; it just happened that way. I bet we haven’t done a phrasal verb in three weeks or a month. So today I chose the phrasal verb “pay off.” There are a few ways to use it, so let me first review the way you heard it earlier.
This isn’t the first time Singapore Airlines has flown from its home base in Singapore to Newark, New Jersey. It used to run this route until 2013, but they canceled it, remember? It was losing money. Well now they have the newest plane, which is lighter and more fuel-efficient. And they are trying a new business model where all the seats are premium seats of some kind—more expensive seats, in other words. They are hoping that this new route will be profitable. They are hoping that their strategy pays off. Their strategy would pay off if it’s successful; if it’s profitable.
You use “pay off” when you make a bet or when you take a risk or change your strategy—and it works. And you get what you wanted. I was watching a baseball game over the weekend where the manager took the pitcher out of the game early—far earlier than managers usually take pitchers out of the game. It was a gamble to change pitchers so early in the game, but the strategy paid off because the next pitcher did even better. You see, it could have been a bad decision. It was a little risky. But it worked. The strategy, or the risk, paid off.
If you invest a lot of time preparing for a presentation at work, and you succeed on your presentation—your hard work and effort pays off. You invested your time, and it paid off if you did well because you were so well-prepared. I’m thinking about replacing some windows in my apartment here in Chicago; some of the windows I have just let in a lot of cold air in the winter. I’m investing a lot of time doing my research and talking to different window companies here. I’m hoping that my research pays off in the form of effective new windows at a good price. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Like most phrasal verbs, there are a few other ways to use “pay off,” but I can’t do them justice—I can’t explain them sufficiently—in the time we have left, so I’ll leave those for another time. Just be aware that there are a few other ways to use this phrasal verb in case you encounter it.
Before we go, I want to say hi to Fabio from Brazil. He’s living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, one of my favorite American cities, and he says he needs to learn English fast! Yikes—maybe you can fly from Singapore to Newark and listen to 95 consecutive episodes of Plain English. Short of that, just keep practicing, watching tv, reading, don’t be shy, make lots of friends—people in Pittsburgh are really nice—and don’t give up. I admire you for moving to a new country and I know you’ll be great in English if you keep up all your hard work, Fabio. And thanks for sending me a note on Facebook at PlainEnglishPod.
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That’s all for today, Thursday. Don’t forget JR and I will be back on Monday. The topic on Monday will be Shinzo Abe, who will become the longest-serving prime minister in Japan’s modern history—and his desire to change the Japanese constitution to officially allow for armed forces. That’s all coming up on Monday, and if you’re lucky I’ll pick another phrasal verb then too. You’ll just have to wait and see. Until then, thanks for joining us as always; be right back here in a few days.
Use realistic expressions like a native speaker
