make ends meet

Cultural  

1. To earn enough income to provide for basic needs: “The workers complained that on their present wages they could hardly make ends meet, let alone enjoy any luxuries.”

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make ends meet Idioms  

1. Manage so that one's financial means are enough for one's needs, as in On that salary Enid had trouble making ends meet. This expression originated as make both ends meet, a translation from the French joindre les deux bouts (by John Clarke, 1639). The ends, it is assumed, allude to the sum total of income and expenditures. However, naval surgeon and novelist Tobias Smollett had it as “make the two ends of the year meet” (Roderick Random, 1748), thought to go back to the common practice of splicing rope ends together in order to cut shipboard expenses.

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Example Sentences

The government hands out discretionary bonuses as a supplement, but it's not nearly enough to make ends meet in Venezuela, where GDP dropped 80 percent in a decade and millions emigrated in search of a better life.

From Barron's

Luisana Serrano, a 34-year-old former nursing aide who now works as a baker to make ends meet, also fled Venezuela in 2018 with her husband and four under-nourished children.

From Barron's

Many others cannot make ends meet.

From BBC

As Pew Research wrote in 2012, speaking of 18- to 34-year-olds: “Recent economic hardship has not dampened the spirit of America’s young adults. Though they have struggled to find jobs and make ends meet, they maintain a sense of optimism about their financial future.”

From MarketWatch

You plan to give up your job and, to make ends meet during your semi-retirement, perhaps become a Lyft driver.

From MarketWatch

Related Words

• collect
• conserve
• keep
• maintain
• manage
• spare
• store