"bean counter" meaning in English

See bean counter in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Audio: en-au-bean counter.ogg [Australia] Forms: bean counters [plural]
Etymology: Probably from German Erbsenzähler (literally “pea counter”) Etymology templates: {{bor|en|de|Erbsenzähler|lit=pea counter}} German Erbsenzähler (literally “pea counter”) Head templates: {{en-noun}} bean counter (plural bean counters)
  1. (idiomatic, mildly derogatory) A person who is excessively interested in controlling or reducing expenses, increasing profits, or in quantitative details in general. The term is often used to imply the person is a pedant and incapable of seeing other things or the bigger picture (more general things), but it is also widely used as a mildly derogatory term and even facetious synonym for accountants, CEOs, CFOs, business and government officials responsible for financial decisions, etc. Tags: derogatory, idiomatic, mildly Categories (topical): People Synonyms: bean-counter, beancounter Translations (person excessively interested in expenses and quantitative details): Erbsenzähler [masculine] (German), Erbsenzählerin [feminine] (German), ciferšpión [masculine] (Slovak)

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for bean counter meaning in English (3.9kB)

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          "ref": "1985 August 2, “Editorial: Sniffing at DOC health costs”, in Gainsville Sun, retrieved 2009-09-13, page 14A",
          "text": "As any good bean counter will tell you, it costs money to treat people at a hospital.",
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          "ref": "2008 December 23, Robert Chew, “Who Is Bernie Madoff? Many Investors Didn't Ask”, in Time, retrieved 2009-09-13",
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        "(idiomatic, mildly derogatory) A person who is excessively interested in controlling or reducing expenses, increasing profits, or in quantitative details in general. The term is often used to imply the person is a pedant and incapable of seeing other things or the bigger picture (more general things), but it is also widely used as a mildly derogatory term and even facetious synonym for accountants, CEOs, CFOs, business and government officials responsible for financial decisions, etc."
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          "sense": "person excessively interested in expenses and quantitative details",
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          "word": "Erbsenzähler"
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          "sense": "person excessively interested in expenses and quantitative details",
          "tags": [
            "masculine"
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        }
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        "(idiomatic, mildly derogatory) A person who is excessively interested in controlling or reducing expenses, increasing profits, or in quantitative details in general. The term is often used to imply the person is a pedant and incapable of seeing other things or the bigger picture (more general things), but it is also widely used as a mildly derogatory term and even facetious synonym for accountants, CEOs, CFOs, business and government officials responsible for financial decisions, etc."
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    {
      "code": "de",
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      "sense": "person excessively interested in expenses and quantitative details",
      "tags": [
        "masculine"
      ],
      "word": "Erbsenzähler"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
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      "sense": "person excessively interested in expenses and quantitative details",
      "tags": [
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      "word": "ciferšpión"
    }
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  "word": "bean counter"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-18 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (1d5a7d1 and 304864d). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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