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Expense vs Debt - What's the difference?

expense | debt |

As nouns the difference between expense and debt

is that expense is a spending or consuming often specifically an act of disbursing or spending funds while debt is an action, state of mind, or object one has an obligation to perform for another, adopt toward another, or give to another.

As a verb expense

is to charge a cost against an expense account; to bill something to the company for which one works.

expense

English

Noun

(wikipedia expense) (en noun)
  • A spending or consuming. Often specifically an act of disbursing or spending funds.
  • She went to great expense to ensure her children would get the best education.
    Buying the car was a big expense , but will be worth it in the long run.
    We had a training weekend in New York, at the expense of our company.
  • * , Sonnet 44:
  • Husband nature's riches from expense .
  • That which is expended, laid out, or consumed. Sometimes with the notion of loss or damage to those on whom the expense falls.
  • Jones reached the final at the expense of Jones, who couldn´t beat him.
  • (obsolete) Loss.
  • * , Sonnet 30:
  • And moan the expense of many a vanished sight.

    Synonyms

    * (that which is expended) cost, charge, outlay, disbursement, expenditure, payment

    Derived terms

    * expense account

    Verb

  • To charge a cost against an expense account; to bill something to the company for which one works.
  • It should be acceptable to expense a business lunch with a client.

    Derived terms

    * expense magazine, (Military):'' a small magazine containing ammunition for immediate use. - Henry Lee Scot ''Military Dictionary ----

    debt

    English

    (wikipedia debt)

    Alternative forms

    * (l) (obsolete)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An action, state of mind, or object one has an obligation to perform for another, adopt toward another, or give to another.
  • * 1589 , (William Shakespeare), Henry IV, Part I , act 1, sc. 3,
  • Revenge the jeering and disdain'd contempt
    Of this proud king, who studies day and night
    To answer all the debt he owes to you
    Even with the bloody payment of your deaths.
  • * 1850 , (Nathaniel Hawthorne), (The Scarlet Letter) , ch. 14,
  • This long debt of confidence, due from me to him, whose bane and ruin I have been, shall at length be paid.
  • The state or condition of owing something to another.
  • Money that one person or entity owes or is required to pay to another, generally as a result of a loan or other financial transaction.
  • * 1919 , (Upton Sinclair), Jimmie Higgins , ch. 15,
  • Bolsheviki had repudiated the four-billion-dollar debt which the government of the Tsar had contracted with the bankers.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-22, volume=407, issue=8841, page=70, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Engineers of a different kind , passage=Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so. Much of their pleading is public-relations bluster.}}
  • (legal) An action at law to recover a certain specified sum of money alleged to be due.
  • (Burrill)

    Derived terms

    * bad debt * debt exchange * debt-equity ratio * debt-laden * debt of honor * domestic debt * external debt * foreign debt * in debt * national debt * technical debt