to pay one's own freight
- idiom
:
cubrir sus propios gastos
- She admired her friend's determination to pay her own freight instead of accepting help.
Examples
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In this club, everyone is expected to pay their own freight for events and meals.
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I always pay my own freight when I travel.
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After leaving home, he was determined to pay his own freight through university.
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She paid her own freight for the conference.
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In this group, members are encouraged to pay their own freight for travel expenses.
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When going out with friends, it's important to pay your own freight to avoid awkwardness.
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She prefers to pay her own freight rather than rely on family support for her expenses.
Synonyms
77
2.8
To pay for something, often for someone else
1
8.1
To accept the cost or bad result of something
Antonyms
How Self-Funded
- Archaic
3
3.9
99
1.0
309
1.0
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly compositional: 'pay' (transfer money) + 'one's own' (personally) + 'freight' (charges for moving goods / costs) yields the sense of covering one’s own costs. Although 'freight' is somewhat specific, the overall logic of paying one’s own charges is predictable and therefore understandable to a B1 learner who knows the constituents.
Etymology
Pay one's own freight comes from shipping, where freight was the money needed to move goods or pay for a journey and someone who 'paid their freight' covered that cost themselves. So today the phrase means 'to take responsibility for one's own expenses' rather than rely on others.