A person who is extremely unwilling to spend money and lives very frugally, often hoarding wealth.
From Middle English and Old French 'misere' meaning 'miserable' or 'wretched.' The Latin root 'miser' means 'unhappy' or 'poor,' originally referring to someone in a pitiful condition, but the meaning evolved to describe someone who makes themselves unhappy by refusing to spend money.
The word 'miser' originally meant someone genuinely poor and miserable, but over time it flipped to describe wealthy people who make themselves miserable by refusing to spend—it's like the word captured a psychological truth that extreme frugality creates the very unhappiness it describes.
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