英语地道说 | get a kickback？得到了一个啥？你肯定猜不到

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第51期：get a kickback

谈完工作，Mike就和常爸讨论起前阵子抖音在美国被收购的风波：

Mike

You know, Trump supported Oracle’s bid to buy TikTok from ByteDance. He used to gave the go-ahead for Microsoft to pursue an acquisition of TikTok and even claimed the US Treasury would have to get its cut for the deal.

（你知道，川普支持甲骨文从字节跳动手中收购抖音。他之前批准微软收购，甚至还声称美国财政部必须从这笔交易中分一杯羹。）

常爸

It means he wanted to get a kickback from the acquisition. He is such a genius!（也就是说，他想从收购中得到kickback。他还真是个人才！）

Mike

You can say that again.（谁说不是呢。）

小小常

Who get a kickback? Do you mean he was kicked back?（谁得到kickback了?你是说他被人踢回来吗？）

Mike

Ha ha, no one is being kicked back, Victor. It’s a little complicated, but “get a kickback”means a commercial bribe, it is not encouraged in business.（哈哈，没有人被踢回来，小小常。这有点复杂，但是“get a kickback”是一种商业贿赂，在商业领域是不被提倡的。）

小小常

OK, then.（那好吧。）

虽然迈克并没有具体解释kickback究竟是什么样的商业贿赂，我们也能猜出这不是一个好词......

根据韦氏词典，kickback作名词有两个意思：

① 佣金、回扣；② 强烈的反应；

在“商业贿赂”这个语境里，取“佣金、回扣”的意思。形容给买方回扣不能光明正大，只好从桌子底下用脚踢回去给买方。例如：

The police chief was arrested after the news reported he was receiving kickbacks from criminals to ignore certain crimes.

有新闻报道说，警察局局长收受罪犯贿赂，对一些犯罪视而不见。消息一出，警察局局长就被抓了起来。

Parents had "blind faith" in antibiotics and doctors, who often receive kickbacks from drugs middlemen, were more than willing to prescribe them, the newspaper said.

这家报纸说，家长们盲目相信抗菌素和医生，而这些医生往往从中间商那里拿回扣，而更愿意给病人开这些药。