escalators

Noun

escalator (plural escalators)

1. Anything that escalates.
   • Fourth, communication researchers study the role of stress and negative attitudes as key contributors to conflict, anger as an escalator of conflict, and emotional residues as barriers to reconciliation.2006, Dudley D. Cahn, Ruth Anna Abigail, Managing Conflict Through Communication, page xiv
2. A motor-driven mechanical device consisting of a continuous loop of steps that automatically conveys people from one floor to another.
   • There is a plastic molly-guard covering the escalator's shutdown button to prevent little kids from pushing it and stopping the escalator.

   Synonyms:

   moving staircase

3. An upward or progressive course.
   • Lots of people fell for the pitch that real estate was an up-only escalator into the American Dream2009 February 19, Froma Harrop, “Housing aid may revive American dream for Latinos”, in Houston Chronicle
4. An escalator clause.
   • They agreed to a cost-of-living escalator.

See all 5 meanings of escalator