Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to the economic theory that financial benefits accorded to big businesses and wealthy investors will pass down to profit smaller businesses and consumers.

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

  • adjective economics Describing the theory that financial benefits given to the wealthy will somehow be passed down to the poor
  • adjective That flows, especially in limited quantity, from the highly placed to others.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • trickle-down economics� founded on the fundamental principle that if you tax the richest people in a nation even less then they will actually volunteer to pay income tax, spend more of their wealth in the country and, eventually, some of that money will trickle-down to the lower levels in society and, somehow, the money spent will improve the standard of living of the poorest.

    Telegraph.co.uk: news business sport the Daily Telegraph newspaper Sunday Telegraph 2009

  • In Washington, he said, they call trickle-down economics the Ownership Society, but what it really means is you’re on your own.

    THE PROMISE JONATHAN ALTER 2010

  • In Washington, he said, they call trickle-down economics the Ownership Society, but what it really means is you’re on your own.

    THE PROMISE JONATHAN ALTER 2010

  • In Washington, he said, they call trickle-down economics the Ownership Society, but what it really means is you’re on your own.

    THE PROMISE JONATHAN ALTER 2010

  • Many have proposed the idea to decrease taxes on the rich and allow a system called the trickle-down effect to happen, where money and taxes will be dispersed across an entire economic system.

    Sam Turer: Increasing the Debt Ceiling Won't Fix the Economy Sam Turer 2012

  • U.S. Video: Dorothy Rodham, mother of Hillary Clinton dies U.S. Video: Plane carrying 230 lands without wheels in Poland Report Abuse Don't pee on my head and call it "trickle-down" economics.

    Yahoo! News: Business - Opinion 2011

  • Supply-side economics, popularized by Ronald Reagan, was also called Voo-doo economics by George Bush41, and is now often known as trickle-down economics.

    Yahoo! News: Business - Opinion 2012

  • Politics Video: Obama praises Clinton's mother Dorothy Rodham Politics Video: Obama Talks Oil and Gas With Texas Station KTRK Report Abuse Don't pee on my head and call it "trickle-down" economics.

    Yahoo! News: Business - Opinion 2011

  • That is the view of Geoff Mesher, a forensic accountant whose Transfer Tracker has been watching the diminishing trickle-down from the Premier League to the rest of the football pyramid with a wince.

    Chelsea's £50m deal for Fernando Torres worries Uefa | Digger 2011

  • This corruption, he said, "has a trickle-down effect to every single religious community in the world."

    Further Observations from a Rabbi 2009

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