"There _are_ individuals and businesses _earning gain_ in the secondary market as well as in the primary market."

[Dan Goncharoff]

As a finance guy, I feel an obligation to guess...

I would define "to earn gain" as "to profit", without regard to the
kind of profit (eg, interest, capital gain).

Perhaps it is a back-formation from "capital gain"?

DanG

On Thu, Feb 17, 2011 at 11:55 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      "There _are_ individuals and businesses _earning gain_ in the
>              secondary market as well as in the primary market."
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _To earn gain_ appears to be a unique construction. Perhaps it's some
> kind of error. The only similar instance that I've been able to find,
> after a (very) cursory search, is:
>
> "Compounding is the mathematical manner where gain on your money in
> break _earns gain_ and is added to your principal."
>
> To paraphrase a couple of lines from an indie movie:
>
> "I'm not even going to guess. You figure it out."
>
> [Protagonist threatens a couple of intruders:
>
> "I'm giving you five seconds to get out of my house. I'm not even
> going to count. *You* figure it out."
>
> They caved and split.]
> --
> -Wilson
> -----
> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"––a strange complaint to
> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> -Mark Twain
>
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