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A spendthrift is someone who spends money freely and foolishly, letting it run through their fingers — and the word carries clear . It is not about being rich and buying nice things; it is about spending you cannot afford, spending that will end badly. It works as a noun ('He was a spendthrift, and the family money was gone in ten years') and as a describing word ('her spendthrift brother', 'spendthrift habits'). The word is a little old-fashioned and literary. Today people are more likely to say 'he's terrible with money' or 'she blows through her paycheck', and you meet 'spendthrift' most often in books, in news writing, and in criticism of governments: 'spendthrift policies'. Look inside the word and you find an old joke: 'thrift' used to mean your savings, your wealth — so a spendthrift is literally someone who spends up their savings. That is why it feels almost the reverse of today's 'thrifty', which means careful with money.
揮霍無度的人；敗家子（帶明顯批評意味）
組成spend + thrift。關鍵在 thrift 的舊意思：它以前指「積蓄、財富、家業」，不是現在的「節儉」。所以字面上就是「把家產花光的人」——這也是為什麼它看起來像 thrifty（節儉的），意思卻剛好相反。
同家族的字
- thrift / thriftysame thrift, but the modern sense flipped to being careful with money
- thrivethrift grew out of thrive — wealth was what you got from thriving
- spend / spending / spendersame spend
原始詞典資料4 筆記錄
以下是外部詞典記錄的用法，原文照列，我們還沒有寫成教學內容。上面的說明才是我們自己寫的；有些用法可能上面已經講過了。
spendthriftadj/ˈspɛn(d)θɹɪft/
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Improvident, profligate, or wasteful.
- Wel, go to wild oats, ſpend thrift prodigal, / Ile croſſe thy name quight from my reckning booke: / For theſe accounts, faith it ſhall ſcath thee ſome what, / I will not ſay what, ſomewhat it ſhall be.
- He was now esteemed quite worthy to address the daughter of a foolish, spendthrift baronet, who had not had principle or sense enough to maintain himself in the situation in which Providence had placed him, and who could give his daughter at present but a small part of the share of ten thousand pounds which must be hers hereafter.
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Extravagant or lavish.
- Rufus's stone lies in the outskirts of the forest, and in a few minutes they emerged upon the broad heath which bounds it, then like a sea of gold; for the furze was in the first glory of its spendthrift wealth.
- A high-powered entertainment that acceded to the spiraling capitalization costs of the big musical with a production of spendthrift command, La Cage [aux Folles] came in at summer's end as a guaranteed hit.
spendthriftnoun/ˈspɛn(d)θɹɪft/
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Someone who spends money improvidently or wastefully.
- [T]hat vve vvould doe / VVe ſhould doe vvhen vve vvould: for this vvould changes, / And hath abatements and delayes as many, / As there are tongues, are hands, are accedents, / And then this ſhould is like a ſpend thrifts ſigh, / That hurts by eaſing; […]
- VVell goe too vvild oates, ſpend thrift, prodigall, / Ile croſſe thy name quite from my reckoning booke: / For theſe accounts, faith it ſhall skathe thee ſomevvhat, / I vvill not ſay vvhat ſomevvhat it ſhall be.
- 2
Anything that distributes its attributes profusely, without restraint.
- It was one of those bright days in spring, which are very spendthrifts of sunshine, when the darkest alley in London wins a golden glimpse, and the eternal mist around St. Paul's turns to a glittering haze:...
資料來源：英文維基詞典 English Wiktionary（CC BY-SA 4.0）。 原文照列，未經改寫。