Other forms: paid, paying, pays
To pay is to hand over money for something you are taking or using. Tapping a card at the till, counting coins onto the counter, the standing order that leaves your account on the first of the month. You pay for the coffee, you pay the plumber, you pay the rent.
Pay is also the money coming the other way, because your pay is what the job gives you, hence payday, pay rise, pay slip and low-paid work. Some things pay with no money involved: crime does not pay, and it pays to read the small print, meaning the reading is worth doing. Then comes a whole set of phrases where nothing financial changes hands at all, such as pay attention, pay a visit, pay somebody a compliment, pay your respects. The past tense is paid, not payed. Watch the preposition as well, since you pay a person but you pay for a thing.
1verbpayTo give money for goods, work or a service.~48%
“He pays the window cleaner in cash every second Friday.”
2nounwagesThe money somebody receives for their work.~48%
“The pay is poor but the hours suit her.”
synonyms: wages, salary, earnings
3verbworthTo be worth doing, or to bring a profit.~2%
“It pays to book the ferry before the school holidays.”
4verbfixedTo give something that is not money, in fixed phrases such as pay attention or pay a visit.~2%
“Nobody was paying attention during the safety talk.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 22 sentences found in the wild and placed 18 of them on a sense (4 were unclear) — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
Pay came from Old French paiier out of Medieval Latin pācāre, to settle or satisfy, from Latin pācō, to pacify, which belongs to the family of pax and peace. To pay somebody was to calm them down, which is exactly what money does to a creditor. It pushed aside the older English verb ġieldan, which survives with a different job as yield.
Latin
pācō — to pacify
Medieval Latin
pācāre — to settle, satisfy
Old French
paiier — pay
Middle English
payen
English, today
pay
Built from
From Middle English payen, from Old French paiier (“pay”), from Medieval Latin pācāre (“to settle, satisfy”) from Latin pācō (“to pacify”). In this sense, displaced native ġield and ġieldan (“to pay”), whence Modern English yield.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA