Business and the economy

The twenty-second entry is l’inflazione, and what is worth taking from it is not the word, which is transparent, but the little word standing in front of it. Italian puts the definite article before a noun used in general; English takes it away. L’inflazione rallenta dall’autunno is « inflation has been slowing since the autumn », never « the inflation ». The same list supplies a dozen more: la concorrenza è forte in questo settore is « competition is fierce in this trade »; la produttività cresce lentamente is « productivity is rising slowly »; il potere d’acquisto è diminuito is « purchasing power has fallen ». The rule is worth stating plainly, because a reader meets it in every paragraph of an economics page and it runs in both directions. An English noun naming a whole class or an abstraction stands bare, and the article comes back only when one particular instance is meant: « the competition from abroad », « the inflation of that decade ». Italian draws no such line and keeps the article throughout. Carrying it over is the commonest way of sounding foreign while getting every other word right.