津贴
jīn tiē · HSK 7
allowance
🧧 jīn tiē sounds like gin-tea: your monthly allowance covers the gin and the tea
贴 on its own means subsidy or stipend, so 津贴 is the extra allowance added on top of base pay. Anchor the sound jīn-tiē to gin-tea, the small treat your allowance pays for.
贴 — shell radical 贝 + occupy 占
A semantic-phonetic compound. The shell radical 贝 (originally cowrie shells used as money) signals the meaning, since 贴 first meant 'to pawn' or 'to pledge' something for money. The phonetic 占 (zhān) hints at the sound. The meaning later broadened to 'paste/stick on' and 'subsidy'.