quota

noun quo·ta \ ˈkwō-tə \

|Updated on: 13 Aug 2018

Definition of quota

1 : a proportional part or share; especially : the share or proportion assigned to each in a division or to each member of a body

2 : the number or amount constituting a proportional share

3 : a fixed number or percentage of minority group members or women needed to meet the requirements of affirmative action

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Examples of quota in a Sentence

The agency imposes strict fishing quotas.
The company has imposed quotas on hiring.
He lost his driver's license because he exceeded the quota of traffic violations.
The department set new sales quotas in January.

Recent Examples of quota from the Web

The electrics venture with BMW is an important boost for Great Wall, which industry analysts warned would struggle to satisfy Beijing's sales quotas due to its fuel-guzzling vehicle lineup and had yet to announce any significant electric plans.

— joe mcdonald, USA TODAY, "BMW group and Great Wall Motors partner to make electric MINIs in China," 10 July 2018
The Dutch Harbor food and bait herring fishery opened July 1 with a catch quota set at 1,810 tons.

— laine welch, Anchorage Daily News, "For Alaska sockeye salmon, record highs in Bristol Bay, record lows nearly everywhere else," 9 July 2018
Officials say the guidelines were misinterpreted to suggest there was a legal basis for racial quotas.

— The Economist, "Politics this week," 5 July 2018
The United States doesn’t have quotas and tries to regulate the market with subsidies and buy-ups.

— tara golshan, Vox, "Why Trump’s trade agenda might worsen America’s cheese glut," 4 July 2018
The administration has announced production quotas for the judges, who are lawyers hired by the Department of Justice.

— amy taxin, The Seattle Times, "Judges thrust into debate over Trump’s immigration policies," 2 July 2018
The former employees said managers had encouraged unethical tactics in order to hit sales quotas.

— david meyer, Fortune, "AT&T Managers Reportedly Encouraged Unethical Sales Tactics to Sell More DirectTV Packages," 25 June 2018
Instead, quotas were still held by North Carolina fleets, which traveled to New England and caught 10 times more than local boats.

— craig welch, National Geographic, "Climate Change May Spark Global ‘Fish Wars’," 14 June 2018
To keep it that way, Yosemite has established trailhead quotas that require would-be visitors to fill out a form and go through an application system.

— tom stienstra, San Francisco Chronicle, "Joining the ‘1 Percent Club’ at Yosemite’s Laurel Lake," 3 June 2018

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

Origin and Etymology of quota

Medieval Latin, from Latin quota pars how great a part

NEW! Time Traveler

First Known Use: 1618

in the meaning defined at sense 1

See Words from the same year

quota Synonyms

Financial Definition of QUOTA

quota

noun

What It Is

Quota can refer to a measure that sets the limits, either minimum or maximum, on a particular activity.

How It Works

Quotas are usually set by government or by an organization of producers of a particular product.

For trade quotas, governments set the quota limiting the import of a particular product, restricting the access to the domestic market by an offshore producer, and giving the domestic producers the opportunity to improve their position in the market. Such protectionist policies in industries including steel, autos, and many consumer electronics products, have protected domestic industry from international competition.

In production quotas, a government or a group of producers, limit the supply of a particular product in order to maintain a certain price level. For example, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries sets a production quota for crude oil in order to "maintain" the price of crude oil in world markets.

Why It Matters

Quotas counteract natural market forces and trends and usually upset normal business cycles. For example, protecting domestic industry from international competition has kept it alive, but has not increased its competitiveness. In an increasingly global economic marketplace, quotas tend to weaken domestic industry. As for production quotas, while maintaining prices in the world markets may sound like a good idea for producers, it can have the effect of forcing consumers to find alternative products (e.g., the search for alternative energy in the case of oil) or worse (e.g., take up arms to fight for rights to natural resources).

Source: Investing Answers