bath

A premature end to something. Primarily heard in UK, Australia. Take an early bath, Edwards! I don't tolerate illegal hits on my playing field!

Sl. to accumulate large losses on a business transaction or an investment. (Alludes to getting soaked, a slang expression meaning "being heavily charged for something.") Sally took a bath on that stock that she bought. Its price went down to nothing. I'm afraid that I will take a bath on any investment I make.

Fig. to dispose of the good while eagerly trying to get rid of the bad. (Fig. on the image of carelessly emptying a tub of both the water inside as well as the baby that was being washed.) In her haste to talk down a project that had only a few disagreeable points, she has thrown the baby out with the bathwater. Hasty action on this major spending bill will result in throwing out the baby with the bath.

to lose the good parts when you get rid of the bad parts of something You can't close the airport because one airline has problems - that's just throwing out the baby with the bath water.

to lose money on an investment Investors took a bath when they had to resell the bonds at lower prices than they had paid.

to suffer a bad financial loss Several banks took a bath when the industry collapsed.

if you take an early bath, you are forced to stop doing an activity sooner than you intended to The spokesman took an early bath after a series of embarrassing and incorrect statements. And that's his second yellow card so it looks like an early bath for Taylor.

to get rid of the good parts as well as the bad parts of something when you are trying to improve it I don't think we should throw the baby out with the bath water. There are some good features of the present system that I think we should retain.

Experience serious financial loss, as in The company took a bath investing in that new product. This idiom, which originated in gambling, transfers washing oneself in a bathtub to being "cleaned out" financially. [Slang; first half of 1900s]

Discard something valuable along with something not wanted. For example, I know you don't approve of that one item in the bill but we shouldn't throw out the baby with the bath water by voting the bill down . This expression, with its vivid image of a baby being tossed out with a stream of dirty water, is probably translated from a German proverb, Das Kind mit dem Bade ausschütten ("Pour the baby out with the bath"). It was first recorded in English in 1853 by Thomas Carlyle, who translated many works from German.

To experience serious financial loss: "Small investors who latched on to hot new issues took a bath in Wall Street" (Paul A. Samuelson).

To discard something valuable along with something not desired, usually unintentionally.