employee
Americannoun
noun
Usage
What does employee mean? An employee is someone who gets paid to work for a person or company. Workers don’t need to work full time to be considered employees—they simply need to be paid to work by an employer (the person or business that pays them). The term employee is sometimes used to distinguish contract workers from full employees (who often earn additional benefits), but in this example, both types of workers are considered employees in the general sense. Example: My company has more than 500 employees.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of employee
First recorded in 1825–35; from French employé “employed,” past participle of employer to employ; see -ee
Explanation
An employee is someone who's hired to do a particular job for pay. If you like to shop in a certain store, you might also enjoy being an employee there. You can see the verb employ, meaning "put to use," in employee. You can employ a pen in writing a letter, just as a grocery store might employ workers to collect the shopping carts from the parking lot. A person who is put to work is an employee. Employee implies that the worker reports to a boss, and it's most commonly used for non-executives who work for a salary.
Vocabulary lists containing employee
"Dogs at Work"
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Vocabulary for the Naturalization Interview
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Units 6–7
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The uncertainty of Carvalho’s status has hung over the district since the raid — and some have criticized his paid leave as the district struggles with budget stress and employee layoffs.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 22, 2026
“It was definitely part of the pitch that we were the good guys,” says a former employee, who said founders and others emphasized the value of improving the market’s efficiency.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 20, 2026
One employee says they are "devastated", and questions how high-quality journalism can be produced when "funding is being gutted".
From BBC • Jun. 18, 2026
“There’s no one-size-fits-all answer,” says Steve Silver, a lawyer at Littler who advises clients on employee policies.
From Barron's • Jun. 17, 2026
Sophie’s father, Robert Scholl, was arrested after an employee overheard him call Hitler “a great scourge of God.”
From "Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
