Word.ws English Dictionary

carrot-and-stick

carrot-and-stick is the alternative spelling of carrot and stick.

Meaning of carrot and stick

Noun

carrot and stick (plural carrots and sticks)

  1. (idiomatic) The simultaneous rewarding of good behavior and punishing of bad behavior.
    • It was this carrot and stick discipline to which Mr. John Mill was subjected, and which he accepted dutifully as flowing from that perfect wisdom of which up to this time his father had been the representative.1876, Lord Blachford, “The Reality of Duty, as Illustrated by the Autobiography of Mr. John Stuart Mill”, in The Contemporary Review, page 523

Forms of carrot-and-stick

pluralcarrots-and-sticks

Questions about carrot-and-stick

What is carrot-and-stick the alternative spelling of?
Carrot-and-stick is the alternative spelling of carrot and stick.

Words near carrot-and-stick in the dictionary

  1. carrot rust fly
  2. carrot top
  3. carrot tops
  4. carrot weevil
  5. carrot weevils
  6. carrot-and-stick
  7. carrot-nosed
  8. carrot-top
  9. carrot-topped
  10. carrot-tops
  11. carrotage

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: carrot-and-stick (page history and authors); carrot and stick (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “carrot-and-stick.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/carrot-and-stick. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.