Skip to main content
Glite Dictionary
💸 Social comparison 👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 A family
Joneses

Joneses

7 7.9
People you compare yourself to because they have more things or a better life
  • noun
  • /ˈdʒoʊnzɪz/
  • Informal
translation icon : los vecinos
  • Many people feel pressured to keep up with the Joneses when it comes to buying the latest gadgets.

Like, like it's what has led me to places like insecurity and keeping up with the Joneses and judgment and parenting.

Examples

  • I don't buy that, and keeping up with the Joneses is just so exhausting.

    Blog text (32)

  • And all she ever thought about was keeping up with the Joneses.

    Fiction book (2000)

  • Keeping up with the Joneses ran this country into the ground too.

    Blog text (23)

  • Trying to keep up with the Joneses.

    Due Season (2022)

  • Someone whose only goal in life is to keep up with the Joneses.

    Blog text (20)

  • In the end, this keeping up with the Joneses mentality is about money.

    Blog text (8)

  • See, in today's competitive parental environment, keeping up with the Joneses is a big deal to some families.

    Blog text (31)

  • In our urban campuses, peer pressure, fashion, and "keeping up with the Joneses" are powerful campus techniques.

    Blog text (24)

  • There wasn't a lot of neighborliness, more of a lot of keeping up with the Joneses.

    Fiction book (1993)

  • Some householders, keeping up with the Joneses, paint their facades shocking pink; others, making the worst of it, settle for grime and decay.

    Fiction book (1991)

Synonyms

peer
vsJoneses
285 2.9

A person of the same age or status in a group

is used as nearby social standards for comparing status or possessions
fellow
vsJoneses
98 1.9

A person in the same group or profession as you

is used as a social yardstick for comparing status and possessions

Surface Forms

Joneses plural

Morphology

Joneses = Jones (opaque) = Jones + es

Although the form is the plural of the surname Jones, the sense 'neighbors or social peers used as a comparison standard' is a conventional idiomatic extension rather than a predictable plural meaning.

Etymology

Joneses in the phrase 'keeping up with the Joneses' comes from an old newspaper comic that showed a family people wanted to match. So, the Joneses became a name for the neighbors or peers you compare yourself to.