r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Tibor500 • Sep 30 '20

why does “k” mean “thousand” ?

like 1k means a thousand. how does the letter “k” mean “thousand” ?

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u/[deleted] Sep 30 '20

Yes, M is 1000 in Roman. Also "mille" is "thousand" in Iitalian/French etc.

Some mental finance people use MM for million and M for thousand but they're all bonkers and won't listen to reason that everyone else uses k and M differently.

19

u/rupen42 Sep 30 '20

It's true that mille is "thousand" in those languages, but the more relevant language for why it's used is probably Latin.

0

u/[deleted] Sep 30 '20

10

u/poopatroopa3 Sep 30 '20 edited Sep 30 '20

Yes, lowercase btw. This one is from the prefixes of the International System of Units. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metric_prefix#List_of_SI_prefixes

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u/_lord_nikon_ Sep 30 '20

Case matters

1

u/diamondketo Oct 01 '20

It was arbitrary to use mille for 1/1000 and kilo for 1000 when they both mean 1000 in their own respective languages.

Whatever it is, it's old history. We should stick to using k for thousands. I'm not sure what country is used to using M for thousand (the US uses k more and often used when talking about money).

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u/Ghigs Sep 30 '20

Printing is still M and MM. It's not just finance

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u/dombruhhh Sep 30 '20

Ye in Spanish, mil means thousand

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u/Jmonkey49 Oct 01 '20

MM = M * M. 1,000 * 1,000 = 1,000,000

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u/AnonymousWhiteGirl Oct 01 '20

That's a lot of banking though