Rates

Part of speech: noun, verb

Pronunciation: /ɹeɪts/

Definitions

1. Assessments that provide a numerical value or ranking of performance can reflect quality or worth
2. Numerical indicators that communicate the comparative value of goods, services, or events are often used in finance or statistics
3. Amounts charged for services or duties ; quantities expressing frequency or speed of an event or action

Etymology: "Rates" is the plural of "rate," but in British, New Zealand, Australian, and Hong Kong usage it has a distinct sense of its own: local taxes levied mainly on property and collected by local government. The word and its money sense are the same thing viewed from two angles, since a rate was originally a fixed assessed amount per unit of value, and a property tax is exactly that: a charge calculated against the assessed worth of a building or plot of land. In everyday speech, "the rates" is often shortened from "the rates bill," and the phrase carries the flavour of a recurring household expense that arrives whether or not anyone wants it. The financial sense has a different and more abstract lineage. Informally, "rates" is a clipped form of "interest rates," the percentage charged or paid for borrowing or lending money. Here the core idea of a ratio or proportion is clearest: an interest rate expresses how much money grows over a period relative to the principal. The same notion underlies the statistical and comparative senses the entry describes, where a rate measures one quantity against another, such as deaths per thousand people or price per unit of goods.

Synonyms: prices, costs, charges, fees, tariffs

Antonyms: values, worth