deficit
Other forms: deficits
If you're running a deficit, you are losing. You might be losing money or losing a game. Either way, you better make up for it.
When the government runs on a deficit, often the loss can be offset by a raise in taxes. If you have a deficit of iron in your body, you should consider eating more spinach. The word deficit comes from the Latin deficit meaning "it is wanting." A deficit is characterized by the wanting of something missing.
Definitions of deficit
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the property of being an amount by which something is less than expected or required“new blood vessels bud out from the already dilated vascular bed to make up the nutritional deficit”
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types:
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oxygen deficit
temporary oxygen shortage in cells resulting from strenuous exercise
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type of:
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deficiency, inadequacy, insufficiency
lack of an adequate quantity or number
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oxygen deficit
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an excess of liabilities over assets (usually over a certain period)“last year there was a serious budgetary deficit”
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types:
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budget deficit
an excess of expenditures over revenues
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trade deficit
an excess of imports over exports
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federal deficit
an excess of the federal government's spending over its revenue
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type of:
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liabilities
anything that is owed to someone else
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budget deficit
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a deficiency or failure in neurological or mental functioning“the people concerned have a deficit in verbal memory”“they have serious linguistic deficits”
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type of:
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deficiency, lack, want
the state of needing something that is absent or unavailable
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deficiency, lack, want
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(sports) the score by which a team or individual is losing
Pronunciation
US
/ˈdɛfəsət/
UK
/ˈdɛfɪsɪt/
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DISCLAIMER: These example sentences appear in various news sources and books to reflect the usage of the word ‘deficit'.
Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Vocabulary.com or its editors.
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