"Pay rise" vs "pay raise"

Question

Which sentence below is correct?

Ben received a pay rise.
Ben received a pay raise.

score 25 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 04 '11 at 17:06

25

That depends.

In American English, a person receives a raise in salary. In British English it is a rise.

Source: dictionary.com

In each region you can even use raise / rise without pay and there is no question about what's increased:

Ben received a raise.

or:

Ben received a rise.

answered Mar 04 '11 at 17:06

Guffa

9,561

Sorry, but as a speaker of American English using the word "rise"instead of "raise" just sounds so .. wrong. Even in the last case. Perhaps it's related to the informal idiom "get a rise out of" meaning to make someone upset. – Michael May 14 '23 at 23:57

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Mar 04 '11 at 17:08

Hmmm - just based the general usage of the words in other contexts, I would say "pay rise" denotes some across the board increase that everyone got due to contract negotiations or gov't action. A "pay raise" would denote that Bill alone got the increase.

Even so - it's a stretch and I would normally ask for clarification as the meaning is unclear - I'm not sure anyone else would see the difference. It strikes me as the sort of differentiation that a specialist in accounting or management would make aot the normal guy on the street.

score -1 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 04 '11 at 16:50

-1

The second is correct. See here for a nice explanation of the difference.

answered Mar 04 '11 at 16:50

Neil

2,722

the linked article is unclear on this point. – Armand Mar 04 '11 at 16:53
Link only answers are discouraged. – Carsten S Apr 19 '18 at 08:43

"Pay rise" vs "pay raise"

3 Answers3

Linked