scratch by

verb

scratch by

verb

Etymology From scratch + by.

1

Idiomatic To get by; to make ends meet.

It all works great for Walmart or the food-service company, but for people like Gina and her friend Nicole, it means they can barely scratch by.2017, Elizabeth Warren, This Fight Is Our Fight: The Battle to Save America's Middle Class:

Synonyms: scrape by

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