Definitions

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun Close bargaining; chaffer.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Present participle of higgle.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Between the two what Adam Smith calls the higgling of the market settles it.

    Lombard Street : a description of the money market Walter Bagehot 1851

  • It is not possible for the individual buyer to ascertain just how much social labor is contained in a coat or a table, but their values are fixed by the competition and higgling which is the law of capitalism.

    The Common Sense of Socialism A Series of Letters Addressed to Jonathan Edwards, of Pittsburg John Spargo 1921

  • How far a man has any right to be more lucky and hence more venerable than his neighbours, is a point that always has been, and always will be, settled proximately by a kind of higgling and haggling of the market, and ultimately by brute force; but however this may be, it stands to reason that no man should be allowed to be unlucky to more than a very moderate extent.”

    Erewhon 2003

  • How far a man has any right to be more lucky and hence more venerable than his neighbours, is a point that always has been, and always will be, settled proximately by a kind of higgling and haggling of the market, and ultimately by brute force; but however this may be, it stands to reason that no man should be allowed to be unlucky to more than a very moderate extent. "

    Erewhon; or, Over the range 1910

  • How far a man has any right to be more lucky and hence more venerable than his neighbours, is a point that always has been, and always will be, settled proximately by a kind of higgling and haggling of the market, and ultimately by brute force; but however this may be, it stands to reason that no man should be allowed to be unlucky to more than a very moderate extent. "

    Erewhon Samuel Butler 1868

  • The executive who leaves or threatens to leave his job for a higher-paying one, or the combination of workers striking or threatening to strike, or the employer moving or threatening to move his factory to a place where labor is cheaper, are all engaged in this “higgling and bargaining of the market.”

    A Bland and Deadly Courtesy skzbrust 2009

  • The executive who leaves or threatens to leave his job for a higher-paying one, or the combination of workers striking or threatening to strike, or the employer moving or threatening to move his factory to a place where labor is cheaper, are all engaged in this “higgling and bargaining of the market.”

    A Bland and Deadly Courtesy skzbrust 2009

  • And both Max and Jackie had heard the story behind the "Wall of Keys" wherein their mom walked off with 100 antique clés -- along with the unusual board they were nailed to — after haggling and higgling with the brocante dealer.

    Brocante / Antiques 2010

  • The value of labor is adjusted “not by any accurate measure, but by the higgling and bargaining of the market.”

    A Bland and Deadly Courtesy skzbrust 2009

  • The value of labor is adjusted “not by any accurate measure, but by the higgling and bargaining of the market.”

    A Bland and Deadly Courtesy skzbrust 2009

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