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View synonyms for diminishing returns

diminishing returns

[ dih-min-ish-ing ri-turnz ]

noun

  1. any rate of profit, production, benefits, etc., that beyond a certain point fails to increase proportionately with added investment, effort, or skill.
  2. Also called law of diminishing returns. Economics. the fact, often stated as a law or principle, that when any factor of production, as labor, is increased while other factors, as capital and land, are held constant in amount, the output per unit of the variable factor will eventually diminish.


diminishing returns

plural noun

  1. progressively smaller rises in output resulting from the increased application of a variable input, such as labour, to a fixed quantity, as of capital or land
  2. the increase in the average cost of production that may arise beyond a certain point as a result of increasing the overall scale of production
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Word History and Origins

Origin of diminishing returns1

First recorded in 1805–15
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Example Sentences

I think if you keep trying to do things the same way it becomes diminishing returns.

As with any exercise, it can be overdone to the point of diminishing returns and negative health consequences.

The Federal Reserve has continued to support the economy with unprecedented levels of bond-buying but with diminishing returns.

The juggernaut franchise that has made obscene amounts of money may have finally reached the point of diminishing returns.

The duo has replicated this formula with diminishing returns—the last one, Humans After All, being the dud.

In agriculture the law is the opposite one of diminishing returns.

He denied the universal truth, for all stages of cultivation, of the law of diminishing returns from land.

The law of diminishing returns applies to mining as well as to agriculture.

Always the worst time of day, the old man pondered, a process of diminishing returns.

How far the operation of the law of diminishing returns will allow this tendency to proceed we cannot here discuss.

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