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inefficient

From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
See also: inefficiënt

English

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English Wikipedia has an article on:
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Etymology

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From in- +‎ efficient.

Pronunciation

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Adjective

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inefficient (comparative more inefficient, superlative most inefficient)

  1. Not efficient; not producing the effect intended or desired; inefficacious
    Celery is an inefficient food.
  2. Incapable of, or indisposed to, effective action; habitually slack or unproductive; effecting little or nothing
    inefficient workers
    an inefficient administrator
    Jessica was terribly inefficient at cleaning, so her brother usually had to clean the whole room.
    • 1987 January 17, Ronald Reagan, Presidential Radio Address:
      The Defense Department, for example, has greatly expanded competitive bidding and is this year submitting to Congress the first-ever 2-year defense budget to replace the old, inefficient, year-by-year process.

Antonyms

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Translations

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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Noun

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inefficient (plural inefficients)

  1. A person who cannot or does not work efficiently.
    • 1889, New York (State). Dept. of Labor. Bureau of Statistics, Annual Report (part 2, page 127)
      Two men were put to work who could not set their looms; a third man was taken on who helped the inefficients to set the looms. The other weavers thought this was a breach of their union rules and 18 of them struck []
    • 1903, Jack London, The People of the Abyss, Chapter 17:
      A general shaking up of the workers from top to bottom would result; and when equilibrium had been restored, the number of the inefficients at the bottom of the Abyss would have been increased by hundreds of thousands.