different between leverage vs effective

English

Etymology

lever +? -age

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?l?v(?)??d?/, /?li?v(?)??d?/

Noun

leverage (usually uncountable, plural leverages)

1. A force compounded by means of a lever rotating around a pivot; see torque.
2. By extension, any influence which is compounded or used to gain an advantage.
3. (finance) The use of borrowed funds with a contractually determined return to increase the ability of a business to invest and earn an expected higher return, but usually at high risk.

   Leverage is great until something goes wrong with your investments and you still have to pay your debts.
4. (business) The ability to earn very high returns when operating at high capacity utilization of a facility.

   Their variable-cost-reducing investments have dramatically increased their leverage.

Synonyms

• (force compounded by a lever): mechanical advantage
• (use of borrowed fund): gearing
• (ability to earn high returns from high capacity utilization): operating leverage

Translations

Verb

leverage (third-person singular simple present leverages, present participle leveraging, simple past and past participle leveraged)

1. (transitive, chiefly US, slang, business) To use; to exploit; to manipulate in order to take full advantage (of something).

Synonyms

• (take full advantage of): exploit, use

Derived terms

• leveraged buyout

Translations

English

Etymology

From French effectif, from Latin effect?vus (“productive; effective”), from effici? (“I make; I bring about”).

Pronunciation

• (weak vowel distinction) IPA^(key): /??f?kt?v/
• (weak vowel merger) IPA^(key): /??f?kt?v/
• Rhymes: -?kt?v

Adjective

effective (comparative more effective, superlative most effective)

1. Having the power to produce a required effect or effects.

   Synonym: efficacious

2. Producing a decided or decisive effect.
   • 1650, Jeremy Taylor, The Rule and Exercises of Holy Living

     Whosoever is an effective, real cause of doing his neighbour wrong, is criminal.

3. Efficient, serviceable, or operative, available for useful work.

4. Actually in effect.

5. (geometry, of a cycle or divisor) Having no negative coefficients.
6. (physics, for any effective theory) approximate; Not describing the fundamental dynamic changes in some system as they happen.

Usage notes

Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary from 1913 still lists efficient and effective as synonyms, but all major dictionaries now show that these words now only have different meanings in careful use. Use of both for the other meaning is however widespread enough that Longman's Exam Dictionary, for example, finds it necessary to proscribe the use of one for the other with several examples at each entry and provides the following summary:

• efficient = working quickly and without waste
• effective = having the desired effect

Related terms

Translations

Noun

effective (plural effectives)

1. (military) a soldier fit for duty
   • 1876, Dabney Herndon Maury, Southern Historical Society Papers: Volume 2, Number 4, Recollections of the Elkhorn Campaign:

     The Army of the West reached Corinth sometime after the battle of Shiloh. We were 15,000 effectives, and brought Beauregard's effective force up to 45,000 men.

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /e.f?k.tiv/
• Homophone: effectives

Adjective

effective

1. feminine singular of effectif

Latin

Adjective

effect?ve

1. vocative masculine singular of effect?vus