Under the entry dedicated to the verb “pay” within Longman Dictionary of Contemporary, it is stated:
"Do not use pay followed directly by a noun referring to the thing you are buying. Use pay (an amount of money) for something”
Then under that entry there is an example sentence which I think contradicts the above statement:
“You pay tax at the basic rate.”
Here “tax” is the object of “pay” but it is directly following the verb, which contradicts the statement. Am I right? If no, why?
The construction you’re using is idiomatic, although “basic” isn’t a word I’d expect to hear in that context in American English. However, the phrase elides some words that are implied by the statement. When one says “You pay tax at the basic rate,” what’s really meant is something like:
You pay [a/the] tax [on something] at the standard/required rate [to the cashier or taxing authority].
In this case, the payee is the cashier or taxing authority, not the thing being purchased. I think the advice could be clearer, as it’s true that “tax” is neither the payee nor the object you’re buying, but “pay tax” or “pay a/the toll” are certainly phrases an American English speaker like myself would say in the right context.
In other words, you pay tax on/for something, or to someone. In comparison, phrases like “I pay clothes” or “I pay lunch” would sound very odd to a native speaker.
No, because you are not buying the tax. You pay the price of what you are buying, you pay the cost of what you are buying, you pay the tax on what you are buying. But you do not pay what you are buying. Their advice is consistent. Note their example "pay (an amount of money)"—you can pay nouns, such as "an amount of money", when they are not what you are buying.
Of course this is a little odd, as "what you are buying" is the reason for a payment, and the tax is also a reason for a payment. But taxes, fines, settlements, etc. can be direct objects of "pay" in the same way money, cash, etc. can, while an object you're purchasing can't; it's just how this verb works in English.
In the example "pay tax", the word "tax" is the functional equivalent of the amount that you pay in a transaction. It is the valuable that was paid for something.
I paid $10 for the ticket.
In that example, the ticket is what you are buying.
A: I paid my tax today.
B: How much was your tax?
A: It was $1000. I paid $1000.
In that example, the tax is not what you are buying. What you are buying is the government service paid for by the tax.
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The "tax" example is irrelevant, since you don't buy tax, and the dictionary is only dealing with how to use the word pay in respect of a purchase (you pay for things you are buying, but you transitively pay tax / fines / attention / a visit with no preposition)
@fumblefingers
When pay is used with a direct object, the direct object is the payment itself. As the book says, it is not the thing you are buying. However, tax is not a thing you are buying - tax is a payment, and we can use it as the direct object.
You can: (these things are payments)
You cannot: (these things are things that you buy)
However, you can:
And you can even:
When an object is the payment, then you can use it this way:
Notice that the beer is not being bought. The beer is the payment for fixing the computer.
If you exchanged currencies, you could even have two types of money in the same sentence, and it is not ambiguous:
