stagnation

[ stag-ney-shuhn ]

noun

1. the state or condition of stagnating, or having stopped, as by ceasing to run or flow:

   Meteorologists forecast ozone and air stagnation.

2. a foulness or staleness, as one emanating from a standing pool of water.
3. a failure to develop, progress, or advance:

   periods of economic stagnation followed by bursts of growth.

4. the state or quality of being or feeling sluggish and dull:

   Happily, they have been able to avoid stagnation in their ten-year marriage.

Word History and Origins

Origin of stagnation¹

stagn(ate) + -ation

Example Sentences

This concentration of innovation in a few dominant companies has led to inequality and, for many, wage stagnation.

From MIT Technology Review

This period, between 1964 and 1982, is called the “era of stagnation” in the graph below.

From Science News For Students

There’s no wasted time and little of the stagnation that usually happens when one player surveys the floor.

From FiveThirtyEight

Much of this discontent is related to economic issues — some of them specific, like wage stagnation and the spike in health-care and college costs.

From Freakonomics

The pattern of no owls, poor sleep, second-guessing, and general stagnation continued on for more than a week.

From Popular-Science

Republicans must seize this opportunity to pass legislation to improve the economic stagnation.

From The Daily Beast

The Taliban, power cuts, corruption, economic stagnation, Osama bin Laden, all of it.

From The Daily Beast

Others face career uncertainty and stagnation as promotion rates continue to drop for both enlisted and officers.

From The Daily Beast

India expects Modi to deliver the country from economic stagnation.

From The Daily Beast

So this is Obama, hope and change, stock market rallies for the top five percent, and wage stagnation for the rest.

From The Daily Beast

This is a state of affairs tending to produce stagnation and vigorously to check advance.

From Project Gutenberg

He was a savage still, and at the close of the struggle he settled down into a second stage of stagnation.

From Project Gutenberg

Once reached, it tended to continue indefinitely, stagnation following the era of growth.

From Project Gutenberg

While talking to this officer, a lieutenant, he contrived to interest him with an account of the stagnation of trade.

From Project Gutenberg

This remarkable contrast between the progress of the north-east and the stagnation of the rest of the country is no new thing.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• sluggishness