properties, business rate, property tax,high-pressure, pitched a tent, aquifer, shared property and grazing land, social rank

Elizabeth Holmes's Theranos under fire - FT.com
Two years ago, Elizabeth Holmes’s Theranos was one of the hottest properties in Silicon Valley. Not any more.


Pitching his tent
He never forgot his origins among the desert wanderers and cattlemen. Despite the gilded mermaids and white pianos of his ludicrous quarters in Tripoli, he preferred to live in a tent, and always travelled abroad with one. When not in uniform, he wore flowing robes. His grandest project, the Great Man-Made River, brought water from southern aquifers to the northern cities. Precious green was his colour, in flags, Book and billboards. His socialism, at root, was based in desert customs of shared property and grazing land. His deep devotion to the army was the gratitude of a poor boy who had used it as a ladder to higher social rank and more grandiose ambitions.



Business rates is the commonly used name of non-domestic rates, a tax on the occupation of non-domestic property. Rates are a property tax used to fund local services that dates back to the Elizabethan Poor Law of 1601. The Local Government Finance Act 1988 introduced business rates in England and Wales from 1990, repealing its immediate predecessor, the general rate. The act also introduced business rates in Scotland, but as an amendment to the existing system which had evolved separately to that in the rest of Great Britain. Since the establishment, in 1997, of a Welsh Assembly Government able to pass secondary legislation, the English and Welsh systems have been able to diverge.



property

NOUN (plural properties)

1[MASS NOUN] A thing or things belonging to someone; possessions collectively:she wanted Oliver and his property out of her flatthe stolen property was not recovered

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1.1A building or buildings and the land belonging to it or them:he’s expanding now, buying property[COUNT NOUN]: the renovation of council properties

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1.2(properties) Shares or investments in property:properties ran into profit-taking, with Haslemere 176p

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1.3Law The right to the possession, use, or disposal of something; ownership:rights of property

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1.4old-fashioned term for prop².

2An attribute, quality, or characteristic of something:the property of heat to expand metal at uniform rates

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Origin

Middle English: from an Anglo-Norman French variant of Old French propriete, from Latinproprietas, from proprius 'one's own, particular' (see proper).

aquifer[aq・ui・fer]

•  記号[ǽkwəfər]
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[名]《地質学》帯水層.

pitch² (pĭch)

v., pitched, pitch·ing, pitch·es. v.tr.

1. 1. To throw, usually with careful aim. See synonyms at throw.
   2. To discard by throwing: pitched the can out the window.
2. Baseball.
   1. To throw (the ball) from the mound to the batter.
   2. To play (a game) as pitcher.
   3. To assign as pitcher.
3. To erect or establish; set up: pitched a tent; pitch camp.
4. To set firmly; implant; embed: pitched stakes in the ground.
5. To set at a specified downward slant: pitched the roof at a steep angle.
6. 1. To set at a particular level, degree, or quality: pitched her expectations too high.
   2. Music. To set the pitch or key of.
   3. To adapt so as to be applicable; direct: pitched his speech to the teenagers in the audience.
7. Informal. To attempt to promote or sell, often in a high-pressure manner: "showed up on local TV to pitch their views" (Business Week).
8. Sports. To hit (a golf ball) in a high arc with backspin so that it does not roll very far after striking the ground.
9. Games.
   1. To lead (a card), thus establishing the trump suit.
   2. To discard (a card other than a trump and different in suit from the card led).

high-pressure 

Synonyms:	forceful, aggressive, compelling, intensive, persistent, persuasive
Usage:	I do not usually buy cologne, but the high-pressure salesman eventually convinced me to give in.