Subprime is in the dictionary! W00t!
July 9th, 2008 | by mbhunter |I was a bit surprised to hear that the word subprime has just now made it into Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary. I guess it takes a full-blown crisis to get a word in edgewise.
The “sub” refers to the quality of the loan rather than the rate, since the rates of subprime loans usually end up higher than loans to people with excellent credit. (”Superprime” just sounds like a Number 17 with big muscles, I suppose.) It’s an innocuous enough of a term to not induce utter panic but has enough of a twinge of badness that we suspect that things aren’t quite right.
At least this euphemism for “risky” can modify both borrower and lender, so any comeuppance can be equally shared. (Or not. Since there is enormous pressure for lawmakers to Do Something About It, comeuppance will probably just get spread around to the rest of us, too.)
So again, I was a bit surprised that subprime wasn’t a full-fledged dictionary word, but I’m also very happy that it’s getting the legitimacy it deserves.
Now if we could just get deflabbify in there too …
One Response to “Subprime is in the dictionary! W00t!”
By budgets are sexy on Jul 9, 2008 | Reply
I agree, I totally thought it was already in there – weird. Gonna go check out your deflabbify word now…this oughta be good!