Belly Up Definition

Table of Contents

What Is Stomach Up?

“Stomach up” is an idiomatic expression in American English used to explain a industry, group, or establishment that has ceased to exist or long gone bankrupt. The word is a metaphor evaluating the industry in query to useless fish or every other animal that has floated to the highest of a frame of water, with its abdominal going through upward, after it has died.

Key Takeaways

  • “Stomach up” is an idiomatic expression in American English that describes a industry, group, or establishment that has ceased to exist generally because of monetary problem.
  • One of the most earliest makes use of of the word was once through John Dos Passos in 1920 in connection with hard work however the word is assumed to have originated within the seventeenth century.
  • “Stomach up” is maximum frequently used when relating to a industry that went bankrupt.
  • Up till the Forties, the phrase was once seldom used, alternatively, it noticed a pointy build up within the Sixties and extra within the Eighties, hitting top utilization in 2012.

Figuring out Stomach Up

One of the most first makes use of of “abdominal up” was once in 1920 within the paintings of novelist John Dos Passos. He mentioned, “Exertions’s abdominal up utterly—The one hope is the I.W.W. [union].” The word is assumed to have originated within the seventeenth century and is attributed to William Douglass. As a determine of speech, this can be a metaphor, as a result of it’s evaluating the topic of a sentence to a useless animal.

If one had been to mention, “my father’s business went belly up in 1963,” one would now not intend to imply that the industry actually died, which might be unattainable. As a substitute, the speaker would intend to metaphorically evaluate the chapter of the daddy’s industry to the demise of an animal.

Stomach Up in Fashionable Parlance

“Stomach up” is maximum recurrently used to confer with a industry that has long gone bankrupt, which is a commonplace incidence within the fashionable American economic system. For example, in 2019, 38,944 American companies filed for chapter coverage, up fairly from 38,032 in 2018, consistent with the American Chapter Institute.

In 2020, overall chapter filings had been 529,071. The rise was once because of the COVID-19 pandemic and the lockdowns that ensued. Or, to word it otherwise, “The COVID-19 pandemic ended in 529,071 companies to move abdominal up in 2020.” On this example, and frequently, “abdominal up” can frequently come throughout as informal, and must now not be utilized in relating to one thing severe or tragic, just like the bankruptcies led to through an international pandemic.

Many elements will resolve the speed and collection of industry disasters at any given time. A wholesome economic system could be a explanation why for an build up in overall bankruptcies since the well being of the economic system may just inspire extra marketers to start out new companies.

One of these situation, alternatively, would generally be paired with a gradual or falling fee of bankruptcies. All the way through a recession, then again, the speed of bankruptcies would normally pass sharply upwards, at the side of the entire collection of bankruptcies. If financial stagnation continues, alternatively, the entire collection of bankruptcies would possibly fall simply since the fee of commercial formation falls at the side of self assurance within the economic system.

Using the time period “belly up” become standard within the Forties, consistent with Google Ngram Viewer. Google Ngram Viewer is an internet seek engine that charts the frequency of the use of a time period in published assets starting in 1800. The time period “belly up” was once now not used frequently till a pointy upward push within the Sixties, with a good sharper build up within the Eighties. It reached its all-time maximum used standing in 2012, and the time period continues to be very prevalent these days.

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