Home › Glossary › Letter D

Daylight robbery

Idiomatic Phrase
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Daylight robbery: blatant overcharging or manifest unfairness conducted openly without shame; the phrase implies that the theft occurs in plain sight, compounding its audacity.

Detailed Definition
Daylight robbery means an outrageously unfair price, charge, or act of exploitation. In poetry, the idiom can support social critique by presenting economic injustice as theft committed openly, without shame. It may appear in poems about rent, wages, empire, markets, debt, or the everyday indignities of poverty. The word “daylight” is important: the wrongdoing is not hidden in darkness but performed in public view. This makes the phrase especially useful for exposing normalised injustice and respectable forms of greed.
Example
Example in poetry:
A protest poem might call the landlord's rent demand daylight robbery; In satire, daylight robbery exposes legal theft in respectable clothing; The phrase suits poems about exploitation and unfair prices; A comic poet could use it for an overpriced cup of tea at the station.
Additional Notes
Daylight robbery means blatant overcharging or shameless unfairness. The phrase is vivid because robbery usually belongs to darkness, so daylight intensifies the brazenness. In poetry it can be used in social satire, protest, market scenes, or comic complaint. It may also be metaphorically extended to time, youth, beauty, land, or labour stolen openly by power.
Also Known As
overcharging
Skip to main content