(ĭ-kŏnˈə-mē)
noun pl. e·con·o·mies a. Careful, thrifty management of resources, such as money, materials, or labor: learned to practice economy in making out the household budget.
b. An example or result of such management; a saving.
a. The system or range of economic activity in a country, region, or community: Effects of inflation were felt at every level of the economy.
b. 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.
- The least expensive class of accommodations, especially on an airplane.
- Theology The method of God's government of and activity within the world.
adjective Economical or inexpensive to buy or use: an economy car; an economy motel.
Word History: Managing an economy has at least an etymological justification. The word
economy can 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
oikonomiā, 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
oikonomiā 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.
