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tread water

Expend effort that maintains one's status but does not make much progress toward a goal, as in He was just treading water from paycheck to paycheck. This idiom alludes to the term's literal meaning, that is, “keep one's head above water by remaining upright and pumping the legs.”

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Example Sentences

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Roberts won’t say this publicly, but the Dodgers just have to tread water until they are whole.

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In the meantime, the Dodgers will have to continue to tread water.

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Would Liverpool tread water or even go backwards for a season or two while his successor settled into the job?

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She believes much of the evidence and options on how to reform adult social care are already known and worries that "continuing to tread water until a commission concludes will be at the detriment of people's health and well-being".

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The American political and media class, Jennings argued, had ignored the fundamentals of inflation and “people feeling like they were barely able to tread water.”

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tread the boards treas.

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