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Tighten Your Belt

Tighten Your Belt



Meaning:

Tighten your belt means that you are trying to spend less money or use fewer resources. "Got to tighten our belt this month."


Origin:

The origin of this saying has to do with hunger, the first written history of tighten your belt was in 1825 in David Stewart's book - Sketches of the Character, Manners, and Present State of the Highlanders of Scotland.

It read:

"When pinched with hunger they experienced great relief from tightening the belt."

This saying was also used during the Great Depression when families had very little money and could not buy enough food. As they lost weight it was said that they had to tighten their belts.

Example:

Now we have adapted the term to mean spending less money. An example sentence of how it is used today is:

"The Smiths are going on a vacation abroad and it will cost them a lot of money so they're all going to have to tighten their belts till they get back."






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