to ratchet
- verb
- /ˈræʧɪt/
- The engineer had to ratchet the pressure on the machine carefully to ensure it wouldn't fail.
- ratchet up the pressure
- ratchet up prices
- ratchet up fundraising
And this our degree of difficulty continues to like ratchet up unrelenting.
- And this our degree of difficulty continues to like ratchet up unrelenting.
- It's not like you get these things and then you can't ratchet back.
- They will bait to draw you out to get your attention and then keep ratcheting it up.
- So take your game and ratchet it down just a drop and you're going to have another game.
- Now the what happens in the polar system is that the power of the nobility only ever ratchets upwards.
- So what you do with this PVC cutter is you just open it all the way up and then you just keep on ratcheting.
- AI bias, which seems to be ratcheting up real fast.
- So why not just continue ratcheting up the scene features?
- You can bring me in here as a tool, let's say, to ratchet yourself up the status hierarchy.
- Another option for Western countries would be to ratchet down oil imports rather than halting them completely.
- And then the third way, which particularly California, Illinois and New Jersey are notorious for is ratcheting up the benefits.
- Like the more the haves get and the and the less that the have nots are are, you know, have access to it's only going to ratchet this whole thing up.
- And when they lose that control, they panic and they ratchet up all of their control efforts to try to regain that.
Examples
-
In addition, the Clinton administration has deliberately ratcheted up the priority of international economic issues for U.S. foreign policy.
Academic text (1996) -
Maybe ratchet it up a few notches, a little higher...
-
We have to find a way to ratchet this up and still have him in some condition to fight.
-
And, of course, with the future of human civilization in the balance, we should probably - ratchet that up a little bit.
-
"We're taking it seriously," she says, "using sustainable local vendors to ratchet up the level of competition.
Academic text (2005) -
Let's ratchet this up a notch.
-
The Obama administration has continued to ratchet up pressure on Islamabad.
Academic text (2012) -
To provide the most visible examples: unemployment has ratcheted up each decade.
Academic text (1996) -
Her strong support for gun control ratcheted up yet another notch.
Fiction book (1999) -
But even as the sectional conflict did ratchet up state loyalties, it ratcheted up local loyalties even further.
Academic text (2017)
Synonyms
To increase something slowly until it becomes hard to reduce
Antonyms
Phrasal Verbs
Compounds
A tool that turns screws one way when you press down, without lifting the tool
- Specialized
A hand tool that turns screws when you press its spiral handle down
How Fast
Surface Forms
Etymology
Ratchet as a verb comes from that same tool: to ratchet something is to move it forward in small steps, just like the device that will not go back, so it means to increase or tighten in stages.