Breadwinner

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈbɹɛdˌwɪnɚ/

Definitions

1. An individual in a domestic unit who predominantly secures the financial means necessary for family survival and domestic expenses
2. The person chiefly responsible for earning the income that supports their family or home
3. An individual who provides the main financial support within a family setting

Etymology: "Breadwinner" is a plain compound: "bread," the staple food, joined to "winner," and in this sense "to win" meant to earn or gain by labour. So the word literally describes someone who earns the bread that feeds a household. The older sense of "win" as "to get through effort" still survives in phrases like "winning a living," and the same idea appears in other languages: West Frisian has "breawinning" and Dutch has "broodwinning," both meaning livelihood and both built from the same bread-and-earn pairing. The image is ancient in spirit even though the English compound is recent by comparison. Bread stood for food and subsistence across the whole of Europe, so a household's dependence on whoever brought in wages or income was naturally put in those terms. The word's sense has stayed steady: it names the person whose earnings keep the family fed and housed, with no sense shift to speak of, which makes it one of the more transparent words in the language.

Synonyms: provider, earner, supporter

Antonyms: dependent, drain