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I found the answer to this question interesting in that he referred to a "75 cent word". I would have called it a 50-cent word, not because I undervalued his answer but because that is how I have heard the phrase. I thought at first that am old enough that inflation caused the difference, but I found a 1976 reference to 75-cent word from 1976, the earliest reference to the phrase I found in a quick ngrams search.

What is the "right" value to use in the phrase "?-cent word" (or, what was the original)? Has it changed over time? Do non-American English speakers have alternative expressions in local currency?

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JeffSahol
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    This phrase also jumped out at me. I'd have called it a "5-dollar word" or an "SAT word", i.e. a word that sounds impressive but isn't terribly necessary. – Jeremy Oct 19 '11 at 16:03
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    Perhaps it increases along with inflation? My mom used to say 25-cent word. –  Oct 19 '11 at 16:14
  • Never heard of it. What does it mean, regardless of the number of cents involved? – Barrie England Oct 19 '11 at 16:20
  • The phrase can be found in books: http://www.google.com/search?q=75+cent+word&btnG=Search+Books&tbm=bks&tbo=1#q=%2275+cent+word%22&hl=en&tbo=1&tbm=bks&ei=g_ueTpeGHqeA4gSXr5mhCQ&start=10&sa=N&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.,cf.osb&fp=aff5e50bd73009ef&biw=1291&bih=720 ; not too many occurrences, but the meaning is consistent – Unreason Oct 19 '11 at 16:34
  • It means that it is good for showing off one's vocabulary, @BarrieEngland. The word in question was pleonasm, by the way. – JeffSahol Oct 19 '11 at 16:42
  • I don't think there is a non-US equivalent. I was unsure what was meant by a 75 cent word, because without any experience of the phrase, I didn't know whether that was to be valued high or low. – Colin Fine Oct 19 '11 at 17:02
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    I've heard "five-dollar word" to mean "a long, obscure word". I don't recall ever hearing "75-cent word". I agree that without context, I'm not sure if that means a long word or a short word or something else entirely. (Personally, I think "quarter" is a 25-cent word. :-) – Jay Oct 19 '11 at 17:09
  • @Unreason: There are nearly 10 times more 50-cent words than 75-cent words in google books. – FumbleFingers Oct 19 '11 at 17:23
  • I first heard this as "25-cent word" about 8 years ago. – The Raven Oct 19 '11 at 17:36
  • If you want to know the psychology of the particular instance, my initial statement was 'SAT word', which immediately sounded culturally narrow..then I thought '"50 cent word" or is it "75 cents", I don't know, 75 sounds that much better; I think I heard someone say that one time'. So, there you go. But it means what everyone thinks it does. – Mitch Oct 19 '11 at 20:52
  • Which is to say that, on reflection, I believe '50 cent' is probably the more recognizable version. – Mitch Oct 19 '11 at 20:53
  • It may have its roots in the phrase half-crown word. Apparently Thomas Middleton alluded to the phrase in A Chaste Maid in Cheapside and Alan Watkins used it almost four centuries later.. – D Krueger Oct 20 '11 at 05:44
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    Lol! We always said " A 50 Cent Word ". was one of those words which was not in our vocabulary, mainly because we lacked the knowledge about the word. (eg; trite, antidisestablishmentarism). I'm a down to earth fella and never attended college, so I'm sure my vocabulary is lacking in what we called " fancy words" ! –  Oct 07 '16 at 13:13

2 Answers2

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Checking NGram for cent word, it seems to me the most common usage is Don't use a 50-cent word when a 5-cent one will do.

The earliest example I can find for a 50-cent word is Printers' ink, Volume 153, Issue 2 (1930), where it's not contrasted with any higher/lower value word. But I think it's being used to identify an impressive-sounding new buzzword, so I guess the speaker already knew the 50-5 saying.

Having invented the English language, we Brits think our words are beyond price anyway, so we don't have any monetary idioms for them. We do use tuppenny-ha'penny and ten-a-penny1 for things that are cheap/low-quality, but there's no standard "high-price" version for expensive/good alternatives.

1 cf US two-bit and dime a dozen

FumbleFingers
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    From American Machinist, Vol. 13, No. 38 (1890): "There has been far too much highfalutin by men who, to cover their own ignorance, have used long half-dollar words to express what no fellow could understand." – D Krueger Oct 20 '11 at 04:00
  • @D Krueger: It goes back a fair way then. I can't help but suspect that a high-falutin' half-dollar/50-cent word implies ordinary ones were already proverbially cheaper. Perhaps initially they were a dime-a-dozen, I don't know. – FumbleFingers Oct 20 '11 at 04:34
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    Thanks @FumbleFingers for the research, and also for the insight on Brit mentality. Interesting that the phrase seems to be American-only...a commentary on American mentality, I suppose. – JeffSahol Oct 20 '11 at 12:59
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The origin of this expression was in the days of the telegraph. When you wanted to send a message over telegraph, you were charged per word. The larger the word, the higher the price. So, "fifty-cent word" (or whatever the monetary amount) referred to a word with many letters, probably the maximum price at the time.

As stated elsewhere, the implication is that a shorter, "cheaper" word would have worked just as well or better in the given context!

anachronisto
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    Wonderful false etymology. But actually, all words were the same price. This is why the ABC universal commercial electric telegraphic codebook (fourth edition, 1899): used codewords such as "municipal" for "must not be" and "murenger" for "you must". – Peter Shor Dec 31 '12 at 17:24