offshore meaning: definition, etymology and quotations

offshore

adj

/ɒfˈʃɔː(ɹ)/

Etymology From off- + shore.

Moving away from the shore.

Located in the sea away from the coast.

an offshore oil rig
Since 1949, Taiwan has remained under Nationalist (Kuomintang) control along with the off-shore islands of Chin-men (Kinmen) and Ma-tsu (Lien-chiang County) in Fujian Province. Chin-men and Lien-chiang County are to end their period of direct military rule and to elect their first country magistrates in 1993.1992, Richard Louis Edmonds, edited by Graham P. Chapman and Kathleen M. Baker, The Changing Geography of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau (The Changing Geography of Asia), Routledge, →ISBN, →OCLC, →OL, page 160:

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The judges said that the right to a clean environment did not bar the government from drilling for offshore oil, and that Norway did not legally carry the responsibility for emissions stemming from oil it has exported.2020 December 22, Henrik Pryser Libell, Derrick Bryson Taylor, “Norway’s Supreme Court Makes Way for More Arctic Drilling”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 22 Dec 2020:

Located in another country, especially one having beneficial tax laws or labor costs.

American companies use offshore services for one reason, said Herbert F. Schantz, a consultant in Sterling, Va.: cheap labor.2000 June 15, Lisa Guernsey, “Offshore Scanners”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 03 Feb 2018:
With pressure building in Europe and the United States for a systemwide crackdown on offshore tax havens the Caymans prefer to call themselves a tax-neutral portal Britain appears determined to make an example of a place that has become a symbol of secrecy and intrigue.2009 October 3, Landon Thomas Jr, “Offshore Haven Considers a Heresy: Taxation”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 27 Sep 2018:

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Moving the prisoners is an indispensable step toward closing an extra-legal offshore lockup that has stained this nation’s reputation and become a recruitment tool for terrorists.2009 December 18, “Guantánamo Must Be Closed”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 27 Oct 2020:
It begins with the anodyne name for the procedures — “offshore processing” — as if these desperate human beings were just an accumulation of data.2016 May 23, Roger Cohen, “Australia’s Offshore Cruelty”, in The New York Times, →ISSN, archived from the original on 21 Oct 2018:

Derived terms: offshorable, offshorer, offshore seahorse, offshorization, right-shore, right-shoring

adv

Etymology From off- + shore.

Away from the shore.

At some distance from the shore.

verb

Etymology From off- + shore.

To move industrial production from one region to another or from one country to another, in order to seek lower business costs, such as labor.

The McKinsey Global Institute says that 750,000 American service jobs have been “offshored” out of total U.S. jobs of about 140 million.2005 July 25, Robert J. Samuelson, “The World Is Still Round”, in Newsweek, page 49:
India has become the leading destination for offshored services.2009, Adjiedj Bakas, Beyond the Crisis: The Future of Capitalism, Meghan-Kiffer Press, →ISBN, page 109:

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Corporations offshore their production, because they can more cheaply produce abroad what they sell to Americans. When corporations bring their offshored production to the U.S. to sell, the goods count as imports.2010, Paul Craig Roberts, How the Economy Was Lost, AK Press, →ISBN, page 8:

noun

Etymology From off- + shore.

An area of or portion of sea away from the shore.

This problem, so far as the offshores of the United States is concerned, is one that is eminently worthy of the attention of the United States Fish Commission and the support of Congress in its attempt to solve it.1884, Report of the Commissioner of Fisheries to the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, Washington: United States Bureau of Fisheries, page XXVI:

An island, outcrop, or other land away from shore.

The Nationalists see that they have nothing to gain—in fact, a lot to lose—by hanging onto the offshores as military bases.1958 October 11, “Signs of improvement”, in Business Week, page 36:

Something or someone in, from, or associated with another country.

If costs are unequally imposed by governments on their offshores, the government makes the U.S. banking industry less competitive.1984, Richard H. Blum, Offshore Haven Banks, Trusts, and Companies, New York: Praeger, →ISBN, page 31:
Though American legislators renewed restrictive immigration policies in the two decades after the war, they allowed employers of farmworkers to import some 4.5 million Mexican "braceros" and Caribbean "offshores," as the workers were called.2001, Cindy Hahamovitch, “In America Life is Given Away”, in Catherine McNicol Stock, Robert D. Johnston, editors, The Countryside in the Age of the Modern State, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, →ISBN, page 136:

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — list of authors.