In the past, wealthy households kept many servants.
Tips
usage
Read yōng for hiring and servants: 雇佣 (to employ), 佣人 (servant), 雇佣军 (mercenary army). A separate reading yòng means a middleman's commission, as in 佣金.
Left person radical, the side form of 人, a standing figure compressed into two strokes. The indexing element. It marks 佣 as a person-related word: hired servants, or a commission paid to an agent. Family: 仆, 佃, 雇.
Right 用 supplies the sound and a strong semantic flavor: a person (亻) plus 'use' gives someone hired for labor or paid a fee. The phonetic encodes the meaning. Family: 拥, 涌, 庸.
