Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or relating to workers whose work usually does not involve manual labor and who are often expected to dress with a degree of formality.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Of or pertaining to office work and workers; contrasted with blue-collar.
  • adjective Pertaining to the culture of white-collar workers, as values, politics, etc.; contrasted with blue-collar.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective of or designating salaried professional or clerical work or workers

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From the color of dress shirts worn by professional and clerical workers, as opposed to the rugged denim and chambray shirts normally worn by manual workers.

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Examples

  • By the end of the 1920s, according to one study, Jews were barred from 90 percent of white-collar jobs in New York City.

    A Renegade History of the United States Thaddeus Russell 2010

  • In Russia, an employment service company, GogoJobs, uses GogoJobs.ru as its fetching Global English web address.xviii In Peru, some job seekers respond to advertisements for white-collar jobs offered by the Lima branch of the medical outfit Merck & Co., while others apply for far more dangerous jobs in nearby copper mines.

    The English Is Coming! Leslie Dunton-Downer 2010

  • In Russia, an employment service company, GogoJobs, uses GogoJobs.ru as its fetching Global English web address.xviii In Peru, some job seekers respond to advertisements for white-collar jobs offered by the Lima branch of the medical outfit Merck & Co., while others apply for far more dangerous jobs in nearby copper mines.

    The English Is Coming! Leslie Dunton-Downer 2010

  • Just one generation after the canals were dug, Irish were proportionally underrepresented in the lowest-paying occupations and overrepresented not only in police and fire departments but also in teaching, clerking, bookkeeping, and other white-collar jobs.

    A Renegade History of the United States Thaddeus Russell 2010

  • SEOUL—South Korean prosecutors are again investigating one of the nation's most-prominent businessmen in a white-collar crime case, raising a new test for a justice system that has repeatedly seen business leaders who were found guilty of crimes pay little or no penalty.

    SK Group Probe Is Familiar Ground in Korea Evan Ramstad 2011

  • In the past five years, the leaders of several other well-known South Korean businesses, including Samsung Electronics Co. and Hyundai Motor Co., have been found guilty of white-collar crimes, penalized financially but not with prison time, and ultimately pardoned.

    SK Group Probe Is Familiar Ground in Korea Evan Ramstad 2011

  • Mr. Einhorn's share of the penalty is one of the highest fines leveled on an individual in the history of the FSA, which has undergone a drive in recent years to get tough on white-collar crime.

    Merrill Executive Fined in Greenlight Case Marietta Cauchi 2012

  • He hasn't come up against a regulator in this way before, said Stephen Gentle , a partner at white-collar crime specialist Kingsley Napley.

    U.K. Issues Record Investor Fine Marietta Cauchi 2011

  • General Motors Co.'s union-represented workers will get record profit-sharing checks this year, while the company's white-collar work force is in for a pay freeze and reduced bonuses.

    Leaner Times for GM White-Collar Workers Sharon Terlep 2012

  • Japanese executives convicted of white-collar crimes often have been given suspended prison sentences, although former Internet mogul Takafumi Horie last year began serving a two-and-a-half-year prison term for accounting fraud.

    Arrests Go Beyond Olympus Kana Inagaki 2012

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