天下沒有白吃的午餐
tiān​xià​méi​yǒu​bái​chī​de​wǔ​cān

there is no such thing as a free lunch

  • created sense approved 天下没有白吃的午餐/天下沒有白吃的午餐 · tiān​xià​méi​yǒu​bái​chī​de​wǔ​cān · there is no such thing as a free lunch — "Initial import from upstream dictionary"

    天下没有白吃的午餐 / 天下沒有白吃的午餐

    tiān​xià​méi​yǒu​bái​chī​de​wǔ​cān

    there is no such thing as a free lunch

    (proverb) nothing can be achieved without effort or cost; there is no such thing as getting something for nothing

    天下 (literal) → 天下 · tiān​xià · the world 没有 (literal) → 没有/沒有 · méi​yǒu · to not have 白吃 (literal) → 白吃 · bái​chī · to eat for free 的 (bound) → 的 · de · [possessive/attributive] 午餐 (literal) → 午餐 · wǔ​cān · lunch

    Changed: simplified, traditional, gloss, definition, pinyin, variant pinyin, variants, separable parts, decomposition

    created sense