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Profit vs Utility - What's the difference?

profit | utility | Synonyms |

As nouns the difference between profit and utility

is that profit is total income or cash flow minus expenditures. The money or other benefit a non-governmental organization or individual receives in exchange for products and services sold at an advertised price while utility is the state or condition of being useful; usefulness.

As a verb profit

is to benefit (somebody), be of use to (somebody).

profit

English

(wikipedia profit)

Noun

(en noun)
  • Total income or cash flow minus expenditures. The money or other benefit a non-governmental organization or individual receives in exchange for products and services sold at an advertised price.
  • * Rambler
    • Let no man anticipate uncertain profits .
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-22, volume=407, issue=8841, page=68, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= T time , passage=The ability to shift profits' to low-tax countries by locating intellectual property in them, which is then licensed to related businesses in high-tax countries, is often assumed to be the preserve of high-tech companies. […] current tax rules make it easy for all sorts of firms to generate […] “stateless income”: ' profit subject to tax in a jurisdiction that is neither the location of the factors of production that generate the income nor where the parent firm is domiciled.}}
  • (dated, literary) Benefit, positive result obtained.
  • * Bible, 1 Corinthians vii. 35
    • This I speak for your own profit .
  • * Shakespeare
    • if you dare do yourself a profit and a right
  • (legal) In property law, a nonpossessory interest in land whereby a party is entitled to enter the land of another for the purpose of taking the soil or the substance of the soil (coal, oil, minerals, and in some jurisdictions timber and game).

    • Usage notes

    Regarding the income sense, when the difference is negative the term loss is correct. Negative profit does appear in microeconomics. Profit by a government agency is called a surplus.

    Synonyms

    * gain

    Antonyms

    * loss

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To benefit (somebody), be of use to (somebody).
  • * Bible, Hebrews iv. 2
    • The word preached did not profit them.
  • * Dryden
    • It is a great means of profiting yourself, to copy diligently excellent pieces and beautiful designs.
  • To benefit, gain.
  • To take advantage of, exploit, use.

    • Derived terms

    * book profit * for-profit * for fun and profit * nonprofit * not-for-profit * paper profit * profit from * profitable * profitably * profiteer * profit margin * profit sharing * profit taking

    Related terms

    * proficiency * proficient

    External links

    * * ----

    utility

    English

    Noun

    (utilities)
  • The state or condition of being useful; usefulness.
  • Something that is useful.
  • (economics) The ability of a commodity to satisfy needs or wants; the satisfaction experienced by the consumer of that commodity.
  • (business, finance) A service provider, such as an electric company or water company; or , the securities of such a provider.
  • (computing) A software program designed to perform a single task or a small range of tasks, often to help manage and tune computer hardware, an operating system or application software.
    • I've bought a new disk utility that can recover deleted files.
  • (sports) The ability to play multiple positions.

    • Synonyms

    * (state of being useful) usefulness, * See also