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Chances are you've heard of a golden handshake, which is a particularly tempting severance agreement offered to an employee in an effort to induce the person to retire early. People started getting golden handshakes (by that name) around 1960; by 1976, English speakers had also coined the accompanying golden handcuffs to describe a situation in which someone is offered a special inducement to stay. The expression turns up often in quasi-literal uses, such as "slapped golden handcuffs on" or "a shiny new set of golden handcuffs."

Examples of golden handcuffs in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web With all these limitations, fertility benefits can be something like golden handcuffs. — Megan Leonhardt, Fortune, 5 Mar. 2022 This year they were booked by the network's producers so rarely that their contracts could be likened to golden handcuffs. — Brian Stelter, CNN, 21 Nov. 2021 Take off the golden handcuffs, and don’t let the lure of benefits keep you from becoming who you were meant to be. — Chris Westfall, Forbes, 22 Sep. 2021 If there exists a compensation package for a former first-round quarterback that lands somewhere between nine-figure golden handcuffs and bus fare out of town, N.F.L. front offices have yet to discover it. — New York Times, 30 Dec. 2020 His team is contractually bound to the sport until 2020 thanks to a hefty pair of golden handcuffs. — Jonathan M. Gitlin, Ars Technica, 6 Nov. 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'golden handcuffs.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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Cite this Entry

“Golden handcuffs.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/golden%20handcuffs. Accessed 19 May. 2022.

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