# costly



## Setwale_Charm

How can I say this in Russian: the maintenance of small-size schools is proves to be particularly *costly*. I am interested in the translation of the word *costly.* 

  Thank you.


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## Maroseika

Setwale_Charm said:


> How can I say this in Russian: the maintenance of small-size schools is proved(?) to be particularly *costly*. I am interested in the translation of the word *costly.*
> 
> Thank you.


Опыт показывает (доказано), что содержание небольших (мелких, малоформатных) школ обходится чрезвычайно (очень, особенно) дорого.


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## cyanista

You could use this good old expression влетает в копеечку. Of course, it's not universal. It would look very nice in a newspaper article but would be inappropriate in a scientific setting. Once again, some background information about the text you're translating could make the task easier and the answers more adequate.


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## Setwale_Charm

влететь в копеечку will not do, it is too informal. I was wondering whether the word затратный has any close synonyms.


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## cyanista

Стоит немалых затрат. It doesn't have to be an adjective, or does it?


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## anderston

Слов "затратный", "затратно" не существует -- но есть слово "накладно".


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## Maroseika

anderston said:


> Слов "затратный", "затратно" не существует -- но есть слово "накладно".


Слово "затратный" существует и имеется в словаре Лопатина.


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## CrazyArcher

Maroseika said:


> Слово "затратный" существует и имеется в словаре Лопатина.



Hmm, can you quote the definition. I would accept it as in "затратная статья бюджета", but hardly as synonymous to "дорогой". 
Now about the expression "влететь в копеечку"... I can propose a translation "to cost a bunch of money".


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## Maroseika

CrazyArcher said:


> Hmm, can you quote the definition. I would accept it as in "затратная статья бюджета", but hardly as synonymous to "дорогой".


No definition, because this is the orthographic dictionary.
But in the same article there are *затратен, затратна*. This brief form may refer only to the qualitative ajective *затратный=дорогой*, but not to the relative ajective *затратный = refering to затраты.*


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## CrazyArcher

Here (ru.wiktionary.org/wiki/затратный) both meanings are noted. The source isn't noted, but I'm convinced it's correct.


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## Crescent

Если честно, то мне кажется что, (несмотря на то, что "влететь в копеечку" звучит очень мило...) здесь лучше всего подойдет либо "_дорогой_", либо "_дорогостоющий_". По-моему, влетает прямо в десяточку.


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## Setwale_Charm

Thank you. I think I will have to urgently notify the authors of the report that the word затратный does not exist.


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## CrazyArcher

Well, the word затратный  _does_ exist, but it's very rarely used in the meaning of "expensive" (I have never heard anyone use it in such a context, to say the truth), it usually means "relating to the expendures", and this way it's perfectly suitable for a financial report.


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## Maroseika

Setwale_Charm said:


> Thank you. I think I will have to urgently notify the authors of the report that the word затратный does not exist.


Why not??
It does.
It is mostly used in the formal language of the officials, that's true, but who said this is not the case?
I doubt normal person would ever discuss the problem in such officiouse terms.


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## anderston

Because it sounds like an artificial word made by half-educated Russian bureaucrat.  There is no such word neither in Ogegov nor in Ushakov dictionaries. Moreover, I was googling in lib.ru, and this word was never used in Russian literature either, except one book of Solzhenicyn.


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## Crescent

To be honest I have never myself heard of ''затратный'' either.. (but then again, I haven't heard of a great deal of a words, so that doesn't really prove anything) and it doesn't seem to be in my ABBYY lingvo dictionary either. 
Or at least the adejctive isn't there, the verb "затратить" is there and means '_to spend_' or '_to expend_'. 
Oh, and I've just noticed something else there:
''_затратный подход_'' = cost-is-no object approach, hang-the-expense approach. 
(to be honest I don't know what either of those mean, the Russian or the English, but it wouldn't have anything to do with the matter at hand, would it? Or is it totally unrelated to Setwale's case? )


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## Maroseika

anderston said:


> Because it sounds like an artificial word made by half-educated Russian bureaucrat. There is no such word neither in Ogegov nor in Ushakov dictionaries. Moreover, I was googling in lib.ru, and this word was never used in Russian literature either, except one book of Solzhenicyn.


Each and every word in any language is artificial, isn't it? 
Ozhegov's and Ushakov's are very good dicitionaries, but rather conservative. Besides, it strongly depends on the edition you are using. However, though the last one - 25th of 2006 - really doesn't mention затратный, this doesn't mean the word doesn't exist, because the "philosophy" of this dictionary is rather conservative.
Lopatin's fixes recent changes more willingly, but at the same time it's quite competent.


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## Maroseika

Crescent said:


> Oh, and I've just noticed something else there:
> ''_затратный подход_'' = cost-is-no object approach, hang-the-expense approach.
> (to be honest I don't know what either of those mean, the Russian or the English, but it wouldn't have anything to do with the matter at hand, would it? Or is it totally unrelated to Setwale's case? )


It means that expenses do not matter. This is typical for any planned economy, meaning that the price of ready item is defined not basing on the market situation, on the balance of offer and demand, but quite another way, namely: you calculate all your expenses for manufacturing your product and add planned profit (in former USSR - usually 30%, i.e затраты плюс плановая рентабельность > затратный подход в ценообразовании), and then sell your product at this price to whom your ministry have decided. And your customer is obliged to buy at that price.
All this results in unrestrained growth of expenses all over the economy, becuase nobody is interested in cutting his expenses.
Something like this takes place sometimes also in the market economies in the case of government contractual work.


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## marina6

To be understood by everyone or only a handful! That is the question.

I've never heard "затратный" but "затратный подход в ценообразовании", explained by Maroseika, seems to be quite clear... for the former USSR.


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## Setwale_Charm

Maroseika said:


> Why not??
> It does.
> It is mostly used in the formal language of the officials, that's true, but who said this is not the case?
> I doubt normal person would ever discuss the problem in such officiouse terms.


 

 We are not normal people, we are officials.


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## Etcetera

Crescent said:


> Если честно, то мне кажется что, (несмотря на то, что "влететь в копеечку" звучит очень мило...) здесь лучше всего подойдет либо "_дорогой_", либо "_дорогостоящий_". По-моему, влетает прямо в десяточку.


A small correction. 
I would suggest обходится слишком дорого. Although I can't see what is done for schools that their maintenance is so costly.


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## Maroseika

Etcetera said:


> A small correction.
> I would suggest обходится слишком дорого. Although I can't see what is done for schools that their maintenance is so costly.


For example, if you have "complete" school, i.e. consisting of 10 forms, you need at least 10 form-masters - no matter how many pupils fall at each form - 3 or 30. Same refers also to any of the specialized teachers: in the ordinary town school one physisist may teach 100-200 pupils and even more; in the small rural school you need one physisit even if only 20 pupils learn physics, and even then this teacher will not have enough "hours" to earn enough money.
In brief, you need much larger teaching staff per pupil.


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