Origin
The use of the word 'lemon' to describe a highly flawed item predates its use in describing cars, and can be traced back to the beginning of the 20th century as a British and American slang. Julian Koenig used the term to refer to a defective model in Volkswagen's 1950s Think Small advertising campaign.
Economist George Akerlof has also been credited with coining the term in his 1970 paper "The Market for Lemons: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism." Akerlof identified the severe lemon problems that may afflict markets characterized by asymmetrical information. A study of rejections of important economic papers noted that before Akerlof's paper was accepted, The first lemon law was proposed in California in 1980.
Read more about this topic: Lemon (automobile)
Famous quotes containing the word origin:
“For, though the origin of most of our words is forgotten, each word was at first a stroke of genius, and obtained currency, because for the moment it symbolized the world to the first speaker and to the hearer. The etymologist finds the deadest word to have been once a brilliant picture.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Our theism is the purification of the human mind. Man can paint, or make, or think nothing but man. He believes that the great material elements had their origin from his thought.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The real, then, is that which, sooner or later, information and reasoning would finally result in, and which is therefore independent of the vagaries of me and you. Thus, the very origin of the conception of reality shows that this conception essentially involves the notion of a COMMUNITY, without definite limits, and capable of a definite increase of knowledge.”
—Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914)