How to Use spendthrift in a Sentence

spendthrift

1 of 2 noun
  • Or maybe one spouse is frugal, while the other’s a spendthrift.
    — Abby Hayes, USA TODAY, 5 July 2017
  • This man only wanted to buy a home for his irresponsible son and his spendthrift wife.
    — Amy Dickinson, oregonlive, 28 Feb. 2022
  • China has pegged its economic future on its spendthrift consumer class.
    — Jane Li, Quartz, 15 Oct. 2021
  • Their spending habits were that of a spendthrift, and there was only one parent really making any income.
    — R29 Team, Refinery29, 10 Sep. 2025
  • In the end, like a spendthrift child whose credit card bill is covered by Dad, the private pension problem was solved in the bailout.
    — Michael Taylor, San Antonio Express-News, 31 Mar. 2021
  • Flushing money down the toilet is usually only a metaphor, reserved for spendthrifts or those casual with their cash.
    — Amie Tsang and Palko Karasz, New York Times, 19 Sep. 2017
  • Their more spendthrift mood spells continued strain for supply chains, which were struggling to fill orders even at lower levels of spending.
    — Nathan Dicamillo, Quartz, 15 Oct. 2021
  • Protesters see the council as a group of irresponsible spendthrifts who have pushed the city to the brink of insolvency.
    — Gilbert Garcia, ExpressNews.com, 2 Nov. 2019
  • In a salary-cap league, every dollar matters, and the league made sure of that by adding tax aprons and a punishing repeater tax to rein in the most spendthrift owners.
    — John Hollinger, New York Times, 16 June 2025
  • The last generation’s spendthrifts have become this generation’s scolds, as controversies recur over the same parcels of land with new names in the old roles.
    — Andrew Rice, Curbed, 26 June 2025
  • So is a reluctant child of that aristocracy overcoming his distaste for the fallacies of class to become the most ruthless spendthrift of them all.
    — Alison Willmore, Vulture, 24 Nov. 2021
  • The hardest parts of the pandemic will pass, but the question is whether consumers will return to their spendthrift ways — revolving high-interest credit card debt.
    — Washington Post, 21 May 2021
  • As countries prepared to enter a monetary union without a central fiscal authority, rules were needed to bind the hands of the spendthrift.
    — The Economist, 31 Oct. 2020
  • Republicans should make liberals justify their own spendthrift ways, rather than playing defense.
    — Erick Erickson, MSNBC Newsweek, 17 July 2025
  • This profile in cowardice comes from two Democrats whose party is facing a possible midterm wipeout thanks to high inflation that has been made worse by its spendthrift policies.
    — Kevin D. Williamson, National Review, 9 Feb. 2022
  • Democrats are compassionate and generous, but spendthrift, dovish, and (in the views of many white people) indulgent of crime and prone to subsidize poor people who don’t want to work.
    — Jonathan Chait, Daily Intelligencer, 17 Dec. 2017
  • An earlier version of this article incorrectly described them as spendthrift.
    — Rochelle Toplensky, WSJ, 16 Dec. 2020
  • In Sri Lanka, the opposition united to beat a spendthrift, vicious autocrat.
    — The Economist, 14 June 2018
  • He was deposed after months of political unrest directed at his administration, which was accused of being spendthrift and out of touch.
    — Katie Rogers, New York Times, 13 Oct. 2017
  • These include two other Latin American governments, with spendthrift Venezuela far outstripping the field (see chart).
    — The Economist, 14 Oct. 2019
  • Caracalla was a spendthrift and unstable ruler, and extending citizenship to the huge populations that inhabited his mighty realm was a quick way to increase his tax base.
    — National Geographic, 4 Nov. 2019
  • The flood of money is even making Tom Steyer, the liberal hedge fund manager running on a platform of combatting climate change, look like a spendthrift.
    — Tim Fernholz, Quartz, 14 Feb. 2020
  • Moreover, when the settlor dies, any spendthrift provisions in the trust will be respected — just like any other trust — to protect the trust assets from the creditors of beneficiaries.
    — Jay Adkisson, Forbes, 11 July 2022
  • Eventually excessive borrowing catches up with the spendthrift.
    — Bill Conerly, Forbes, 16 Oct. 2021
  • The biggest spendthrift and borrower is the federal government, not individual consumers.
    — Phillip Molnar, San Diego Union-Tribune, 26 Nov. 2021
  • Many in Wall Street also are pointing out that rising house prices could make today’s higher inflation less temporary than assumed, by making households more spendthrift and pushing up shelter costs.
    — Jon Sindreu, WSJ, 19 June 2021
  • The surprise abdication and quiet succession earlier this year were undoubtedly an attempt to refresh the country’s image of a spendthrift and corrupt monarchy in peril.
    — Leah McLaren, Newsweek, 17 Sep. 2014
  • The siblings fired back, characterizing her as a spendthrift who once charged two Hermes Birkin handbags to her hotel room in Las Vegas and pressured him into a hasty wedding.
    — Jean Marbella, baltimoresun.com, 21 Aug. 2020
  • His powerful ministry, which drove German policy during the euro crisis, has suspicion of spendthrift foreigners coursing through its corridors.
    — The Economist, 8 Mar. 2018
  • Despite her misgivings about her spendthrift compatriots, Shumovitch became an education consultant.
    — Simon Usborne, Town & Country, 15 June 2022

spendthrift

2 of 2 adjective
  • That is all the more reason the state must get a better handle on its spendthrift ways.
    — The Editorial Board, Oc Register, 13 Jan. 2026
  • It would be accompanied by state audits into how spendthrift local governments overcharge for roads, school construction and parks.
    — Stephen Moore, Boston Herald, 19 Sep. 2025
  • To prevent this from occurring, parents can create an estate plan that ultimately places a spendthrift child’s inheritance into a trust that regulates how much the child can take out.
    — Ty Bernicke, Forbes.com, 5 Mar. 2026
  • Thanks to money-hungry special interests and spendthrift leaders, Californians pay among the highest corporate, sales, gas and income taxes in the nation.
    — The Editorial Board, Oc Register, 9 Sep. 2025
  • In many states, including Maryland, debtors may exempt substantial assets from bankruptcy, including retirement accounts, spendthrift trusts and substantial equity in real estate (unlimited in Texas).
    — George Liebmann, Baltimore Sun, 11 Apr. 2026

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'spendthrift.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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