English - Grammer Problem : better and better off

2007-12-26 7:47 pm
Dear Writing Experts,

My lecturer have corrected one of sentence as below:

Before : Sales are better off this year.

After: Sales have been better this year.

I checked form dictionary that better off means (phrase 景況較佳;更有餘裕)

then except grammer : I think is correct to say : 今年銷售景況較佳。Why use 'better' instead?

Please help.

Branda LO

回答 (2)

2007-12-28 3:15 am
✔ 最佳答案
知識朋友,看到你肯思想,並查字典後,就覺得假以時日,你也能成為英文專家。但相信你所查考的字典是yahoo字典,yahoo字典雖然好,但卻有時,特別是片語,沒有說明其用法
若你查考牛津第六版,你會發覺better off有兩個解釋
1)to have more money更富裕:如:Families will be better offunder the new law(新法律會使家庭經濟寬裕一些)
2)be better off (doing sth) :used to say sb(someone) is /would be happier or more satisfied if they were in a particular position or did a particular thing.
你留意到第二個用法,是針對著someone(是有生命的東西),而不是情況:如:She is better off without him.(沒有他,她活得更幸福)
The weather was so bad we'd have been better off staying at home(天氣非常惡劣,我們還不如呆在家裏舒服)。
所以,你的句子是”情況”,就不能用better off,因為情況不能更開心,更滿意

希望幫到你!
2007-12-27 9:33 am
better dog and why dog


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