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workaholic

[wurk-uh-haw-lik, -hol-ik]
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SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR workaholic ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a person who works compulsively at the expense of other pursuits.

RELATED WORDS

laborer, toiler, servant, worker, grind, peon, menial, workhorse, plodder, factotum

Nearby words

  1. work-study program,
  2. work-to-rule,
  3. work-up,
  4. workable,
  5. workaday,
  6. workaround,
  7. workbag,
  8. workbasket,
  9. workbench,
  10. workboat

Origin of workaholic

First recorded in 1965–70; work + -aholic
Related formswork·a·hol·ism, noun
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for workaholic

British Dictionary definitions for workaholic

workaholic

noun

  1. a person obsessively addicted to work
  2. (as modifier)workaholic behaviour

Word Origin for workaholic

C20: from work + -holic, coined in 1971 by Wayne Oates, US author
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
Word Origin and History for workaholic

workaholic

n.

1968, coined from work (n.) with second element abstracted absurdly from alcoholic. This sets up the old Rodney Dangerfield joke: "My old man was a workaholic: every time he thought about work, he got drunk."

Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
Medicine definitions for workaholic

workaholic

[wûr′kə-hô′lĭk]

n.

One who has a compulsive and unrelenting need to work.
The American Heritage® Stedman's Medical Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company.