syuttyouhi ga takai desu.

Questions & Answers about syuttyouhi ga takai desu.

How do you read 出張費 が 高い です?

It is read:

しゅっちょうひ が たかい です。

Breakdown:

  • 出張 = しゅっちょう = business trip
  • 費 = ひ = expense / cost
  • 高い = たかい = high / expensive
  • です = polite sentence ending

So 出張費 means business trip expenses or business trip cost.

Why is が used here?

が marks the thing being described by the adjective.

In this sentence:

  • 出張費が高いです = The business trip expenses are high / expensive.

You can think of it as:

  • As for what is high? → the business trip expenses

With adjectives like 高い, が often marks what has that quality.

Could I use は instead of が?

Yes, 出張費は高いです is also possible, but the nuance changes.

  • 出張費が高いです
    Focuses more on the fact that the business trip expenses are high.
  • 出張費は高いです
    Makes business trip expenses the topic, often with a slight contrast, like As for business trip expenses, they’re high.

In many everyday situations, both can work. Learners often see が here because it directly marks what is being described.

Why is it 高いです and not 高いだ or 高いですだ?

高い is an い-adjective.

For い-adjectives, you do not add だ in normal speech.
The polite form is simply:

  • 高い → plain
  • 高いです → polite

So:

  • 出張費が高い。 = plain
  • 出張費が高いです。 = polite

高いだ and 高いですだ are incorrect.

Is です acting like to be here?

Not exactly.

In this sentence, です mainly adds politeness.
The adjective 高い already carries the meaning is high / is expensive.

So:

  • 高い already means something like is expensive
  • です just makes it polite

That is different from English, where you need is:

  • English: The expense is high
  • Japanese: 出張費が高い (already complete)
Does 高い mean high or expensive here?

Here it means expensive or costly.

高い can mean both:

  • high for height, level, price, etc.
  • expensive for things that cost a lot

Because 出張費 is a cost, the natural meaning is:

  • business trip expenses are expensive
  • or more natural English: business trip expenses are high
Why isn’t there a word for the or are in the Japanese sentence?

Japanese usually does not require articles like the or a, and it often does not use a separate word for are / is in adjective sentences.

So:

  • 出張費 can mean business trip expenses, the business trip expenses, or business trip cost, depending on context
  • 高い already covers the idea of are high / are expensive

Japanese relies much more on context than English does.

Is the spacing normal in 出張費 が 高い です。?

No, normally Japanese is written without spaces:

出張費が高いです。

Spaces are often added only in teaching materials to make the parts easier to see.

Is this sentence natural Japanese?

Yes, it is grammatically natural and understandable.

It means something like:

  • Business trip expenses are high.
  • The cost of a business trip is high.

Depending on context, a speaker might also say:

  • 出張費は高いです。
  • 出張の費用は高いです。

But 出張費が高いです is a perfectly fine sentence.

What is the basic sentence structure here?

The structure is:

noun + が + い-adjective + です

In this case:

  • 出張費 = noun
  • が = subject marker
  • 高い = い-adjective
  • です = politeness

This is a very common pattern in Japanese, for example:

  • 値段が高いです。 = The price is high.
  • 山が高いです。 = The mountain is high.
  • 気温が高いです。 = The temperature is high.
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Japanese verbs conjugate based on tense, politeness, and mood. For example, the polite present form adds ‑ます to the verb stem, while the past tense uses ‑ました. Unlike English, Japanese verbs don't change based on the subject — the same form works for "I", "you", and "they".

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