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The Definition of Economy

Dictionary Definitions

Complete entries:

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language. Third Edition. 1996.

e·con·o·my...n., pl.-mies. Abbr. econ.

1. Careful, thrifty management of resources, such as money, materials, or labor: learned to practice economy in making out the household budget.
2. An example or result of such management; a saving.
1. The system or range of economic activity in a country, region, or community: Effects of inflation were felt at every level of the economy.
2. A specific type of economic system: an industrial economy; a planned economy.
An orderly, functional arrangement of parts; an organized system: “the sense that there is a moral economy in the world, that good is rewarded and evil is punished” (George F. Will).
Efficient, sparing, or conservative use: wrote with an economy of language; a well-organized group that worked with an economy of effort.
Economy class.
Theology. The method of God’s government of and activity within the world.

—economy adj. Economical or inexpensive to buy or use: an economy car; an economy motel.

[Middle English yconomye, management of a household, from Latin oeconomia, from Greek oikonomia, from oikonomos, one who manages a household: oikos, house; see weik-1 in Appendix + nemein, to allot, manage; see nem- in Appendix.]

WORD HISTORY: Managing an economy has at least an etymological justification. The word economy can probably be traced back to the Greek word oikonomos, “one who manages a household,” derived from oikos, “house,” and nemein, “to manage.” From oikonomos was derived oikonomia, which had not only the sense “management of a household or family” but also senses such as “thrift,” “direction,” “administration,” “arrangement,” and “public revenue of a state.” The first recorded sense of our word economy, found in a work possibly composed in 1440, is “the management of economic affairs,” in this case, of a monastery. Economy is later recorded in other senses shared by oikonomia in Greek, including “thrift” and “administration.” What is probably our most frequently used current sense, “the economic system of a country or an area,” seems not to have developed until the 19th or 20th century.

Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary. 1998.

economy \e con o my\, n.; pl. economies. [F. ['e]conomie, L. oeconomia household management, fr. Gr. ?, fr. ? one managing a household; ? house (akin to L. vicus village, E. vicinity) + ? usage, law, rule, fr. ne`mein to distribute, manage. See Vicinity, Nomad.]

The management of domestic affairs; the regulation and government of household matters; especially as they concern expense or disbursement; as, a careful economy.

Himself busy in charge of the household economies.
—Froude.

Orderly arrangement and management of the internal affairs of a state or of any establishment kept up by production and consumption; esp., such management as directly concerns wealth; as, political economy.
The system of rules and regulations by which anything is managed; orderly system of regulating the distribution and uses of parts, conceived as the result of wise and economical adaptation in the author, whether human or divine; as, the animal or vegetable economy; the economy of a poem; the Jewish economy.

The position which they [the verb and adjective] hold in the general economy of language.
—Earle.

In the Greek poets, as also in Plautus, we shall see the economy…of poems better observed than in Terence.
—B. Jonson.

The Jews already had a Sabbath, which, as citizens and subjects of that economy, they were obliged to keep.
—Paley.

Thrifty and frugal housekeeping; management without loss or waste; frugality in expenditure; prudence and disposition to save; as, a housekeeper accustomed to economy but not to parsimony.

Political economy. See under Political.

Syn: Economy, Frugality, Parsimony. Economy avoids all waste and extravagance, and applies money to the best advantage; frugality cuts off indulgences, and proceeds on a system of saving. The latter conveys the idea of not using or spending superfluously, and is opposed to lavishness or profusion. Frugality is usually applied to matters of consumption, and commonly points to simplicity of manners; parsimony is frugality carried to an extreme, involving meanness of spirit, and a sordid mode of living. Economy is a virtue, and parsimony a vice.

Webster’s New Collegiate Dictionary. 1961.

e·con'· o·my (-mi), n.; pl. –MIES (-miz). [F. or L.; F. economie, fr. L. oeconomia household management, fr. Gr. oikonomia, fr. oikonomos a steward, fr. oikos house + a derivative of nemein to manage.]

The management or regulation of domestic or household affairs with special regard for costs; hence, management of the affairs of a community, estate, or establishment, and directly concerned with its maintenance or productiveness.
Thrifty administration; often retrenchment in expenditure; strict husbanding of resources.
An economizing act, move, or means; also, the disposition to economize.
The management or ordering of parts, functions, etc., in an organic or organized system; organization; also, a system or body so managed or ordered.
An economic stage in man’s development or history; also the economic system characterizing such a stage; as, a slave economy; barter economy.
Theol. a. The Creator’s plan; the design of Providence. b. A special dispensation suited to the needs of a nation or period; as, the Mosaic economy.

Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. 10th ed. 1998.

e·con·o·my … n, pl –mies [MF yconomie, fr. ML oeconomia, fr. Gk. oikonomia, fr. oikonomos household manager, fr. oikos, house + nemein to manage—more at vicinity, nimble] (15c)

archaic: the management of household or private affairs and esp. expenses
1. thrifty and efficient use of material resources : frugality in expenditures; also : an instance or a means of economizing: SAVING
2. efficient and concise use of nonmaterial resources (as effort, language, or motion)
the arrangement or mode of operation of something: ORGANIZATION
the structure of economic life in a country, area, or period; spec.: an economic system

American Heritage | Webster’s Revised Unabridged
Webster’s New Collegiate | Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate

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