The strong yen hurts Japanese exporters struggling to sell goods that are now more expensive in foreign markets.

VOA: standard.2009.12.03

Venezuelan oil analyst Juan Carlos Sosa says the government has diverted funds from oil infrastructure in order to sustain ever-more-expensive socialist initiatives.

VOA: standard.2010.08.06

The shutdown is bad news for the recession-hit country partly because it will lose a source of cheap electricity and be forced to import more expensive energy.

VOA: standard.2010.01.01

Republicans oppose a proposed surtax on high wage earnings to pay for the new system, and assert that plan amounts to a government takeover of health care that would be far more expensive than Democrats and the president project.

VOA: standard.2009.07.21

"I do believe we probably should step up the relatively unobtrusive and relatively easy, although sometimes somewhat expensive, means of looking for explosives perhaps many more K-9 bomb teams at these kinds of places and we should continue put a lot of resources in intelligence work."

VOA: standard.2010.03.30

At an estimated $87 billion, the measure would expand health insurance coverage to about currently without it,create new private insurance marketplaces, And,like the slightly more expensive measure passed by the House of Representatives, it would end a practice by private insurance companies of denying coverage to individuals with existing health problems.

VOA: standard.2009.12.25