Economy (linguistics)

The economy principle in linguistics, also known as linguistic economy, is a functional explanation of linguistic form. It suggests that the organization of phonology, morphology, lexicon and syntax is fundamentally based on a compromise between simplicity and clarity, two desirable but to some extent incompatible qualities. The more distinctive elements that a language has, for example, phonemes or functional markers, the more it will promote hearer-easiness. This, however, occurs on the expense of the speaker, who must make a greater effort to convey a message. An economic solution yields good communicative value without excessive time and energy costs.

The word 'economy' derives from Greek oikòs ('house') and nomòs (from némein, 'to deliver'). The notion of good household management is transferred metaphorically from a social to a linguistic level where it represents a force maintaining systemic equilibrium. The same principle—a compromise between gain and cost—also applies to biological systems. However, functional linguistics does not consider itself to be a part of evolutionary biology, but both as belonging to systems theory, and both as being governed by the logic of trade-off. In linguistics, the economy principle suggests that language change cannot make languages exceedingly difficult to produce or process, predicting that the constant changes that are natural to language, despite appearing to have a deteriorating effect, ultimately do not make languages less suited for intercommunication.