payroll
Americannoun
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a list of employees to be paid, with the amount due to each.
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the sum total of these amounts.
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the actual money on hand for distribution.
The bandits got away with the payroll.
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the total number of people employed by a business firm or organization.
verb (used with object)
noun
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a list of employees, specifying the salary or wage of each
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the total of these amounts or the actual money equivalent
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( as modifier )
a payroll tax
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Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of payroll
Explanation
A company's payroll is a complete list of everyone who works there and how much money they make. The small coffee shop where you work might have just four employees on its payroll. Any business or organization with a paid staff has a payroll. A school's payroll might include the principal, teachers, office workers, school nurse, and maintenance workers, for example. You can also use the term payroll for the entire amount of money that a company pays its workers over the course of a year, or for the department that calculates these salaries and hands out paychecks.
Vocabulary lists containing payroll
This Week in Words: Current Events Vocab for October 22–October 28, 2022
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Government and the Economy, Sections 3–5
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Century 21 Accounting, 9e, Chapters 11-14
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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.
See Examples For:
In 2026, annual income of $184,500 is the maximum amount applied to the Social Security payroll tax.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026
He also transferred more than £879,000 to his wife, who was on the "payroll for tax purposes".
From BBC ● Jul. 27, 2026
Although many initially expressed support for higher payroll taxes, support declined significantly when the costs were presented in dollar terms.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 20, 2026
For a team that will spend almost half a billion dollars on its player payroll and luxury tax this season, its most important trade deadline pickup could be a catcher making maybe $1 million.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 18, 2026
The most marked manifestation of the trend was an enhanced standard of living for Rad Lab scientists placed on the government payroll as consultants.
From "Big Science" by Michael Hiltzik
Bank of America’s own data, based on customer deposits, points to better jobs-market growth than either the Bureau of Labor Statistics or payrolls processor ADP is reporting.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 8, 2026
The dollar and Treasury yields fell following Thursday’s nonfarm payrolls data, in turn increasing the appeal of nonyielding gold.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 3, 2026
Nonfarm payrolls for June are due at 8:30 a.m., with growth of 115,000 jobs expected.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 2, 2026
—The dollar edged lower ahead of the U.S. nonfarm payrolls report.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 2, 2026
You told me you were not on the payrolls of this company.
From The Rules of the Game by White, Stewart Edward
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.
