incentive

From Medieval Latin incentīvus (“that strikes up or sets the tune”), from incinō (“to strike up”), from in- (“in, on”) + canō (“to sing”). The formation appears to have been influenced by incendō (“to set on fire”).

• IPA^(key): /ɪnˈsɛntɪv/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛntɪv
• Hyphenation: in‧cen‧tive

incentive (plural incentives)

1. Something that motivates, rouses, or encourages.

   I have no incentive to do housework right now.

   • 2013 June 7, David Simpson, “Fantasy of navigation”, in The Guardian Weekly‎^[1], volume 188, number 26, page 36:

     It is tempting to speculate about the incentives or compulsions that might explain why anyone would take to the skies in [the] basket [of a balloon]: perhaps out of a desire to escape the gravity of this world or to get a preview of the next; […].

2. A bonus or reward, often monetary, to work harder.

   Management offered the sales team a $500 incentive for each car sold.

• disincentive

• eco-incentive
• incentivise
• incentivize
• tax incentive

• → German: Incentive

incentive (comparative more incentive, superlative most incentive)

1. Inciting; encouraging or moving; rousing to action; stimulating.
   • 1667, attributed to Richard Allestree, The Causes of the Decay of Christian Piety. […], London: […] R. Norton for T. Garthwait, […], →OCLC:

     Competency is of all other proportions the most incentive to industry.

2. Serving to kindle or set on fire.
   • 1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC:

     Part incentive reed / Provide, pernicious with one touch of fire.

• “incentive”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “incentive”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.

• Vicentine

incentive

1. inflection of incentivar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

incentīve

1. vocative masculine singular of incentīvus

incentive

1. inflection of incentivar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

incentive

1. inflection of incentivar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative