Word.ws English Dictionary

hellfare

hellfare noun: deplorable welfare; welfare that causes more anguish than good.

Noun

hellfare (uncountable)

  1. Deplorable welfare; welfare that causes more anguish than good.
    • He hesitated again before he said: “Well, we have done a lot of welfare work." “Welfare!" I exclaimed. “You can boast of that? You must know what labor calls that—hellfare work."1989, Saul Alinsky, Reveille for Radicals
    • I am willing to pay a fair amount, but not to be mulcted in that vindictive way, and nuts to the Hellfare State.2008, Norman T. Gates, Richard Aldington

Origin of hellfare

Blend of hell + welfare, equivalent to hell + fare.

Questions about hellfare

What does hellfare mean?
Hellfare means deplorable welfare; welfare that causes more anguish than good.
What part of speech is hellfare?
Hellfare is a noun.

Words near hellfare in the dictionary

  1. hellevator
  2. hellevators
  3. Hellevoetsluis
  4. Hellewell
  5. Hellewells
  6. hellfare
  7. hellfire
  8. Hellfire Club
  9. Hellfire Clubs
  10. hellfires
  11. hellgramite

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hellfare (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.

Last updated:

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