Dictionary

jack up en · VERB

Pronunciation

• (Australia) audio

Etymology

* Sense of “hoist with a jack” is from 1885; then, “increase prices, etc.” (1904, American English); both ultimately from noun jack (“mechanical device used to raise heavy objects”) * “Screw up, mess up” sense derived from, or influenced by fuck up, as a bowdlerization; also possibly influenced by jacked up (“high, intoxicated”) * First dialectal idiomatic meaning: “abandon, give up” (1873), possibly a corruption of chuck up, as chuck up the sponge (“give up, concede, give token of submission”)

Meanings

1. To raise, hoist, or lift a thing using a jack, or similar means.
   • Nor was there any proof that they had been improperly used in jacking up the end of the car. 1907, United States Circuit Courts of Appeals Reports, volume 82, page 433:
   • The oil rig can be jacked up higher when the hydraulic legs touch the sea floor.
   • When alteration of train formation is necessary, coupling and uncoupling of sections is carried out by jacking up the front end of each section so that the socket of the drawbar is lifted clear of the pin of the drawbar of the section ahead. 1962 September, P. Ransome-Wallis, “The Talgo trains of Spain”, in Modern Railways, page 179:
   • He jacked the car up to change the tire
   • From this time forward the overhang to the east of the center row was carried entirely on the clay, the shoring screws from the G and H piers having been removed to assist in jacking up at the west side. 1916, Engineering and Contracting, volume 45, page 113:
   • 1987 August, A. K. Hamlin, letter to Homeowners′ Clinic, Popular Mechanics, page 109, How can I secure them without jacking up the whole house to get the bolts in?
   • With certain girder bridges, the increased clearance is achieved by jacking up the entire superstructure with the bridge deck intact. 1958 July 14, “Bridge Reconstruction for L.M.R. Electrification”, in Railway Magazine, page 488:
2. (informal) To raise, increase, or accelerate; often said of prices, fees, or rates.
   • Although 4.1 million tickets were sold for the 2023 shows—including over 2 million on the first day, a new record—scalpers jacked up prices on the secondary market to more than $22,000. 2023 December 6, Sam Lansky, “Person of Year 2023 : Taylor Swift”, in Time, archived from the original on 06 Dec 2023:
   • I can't believe they're going to jack up the price of gasoline again — and after they already raised it twenty cents a gallon!
3. (colloquial) To ruin; wreck; mess up; screw up; sometimes as a bowdlerized substitution for fuck up.
   • I'm not letting him use my computer again; he always jacks it up.
4. (Australia, West-Country, dialectal, intransitive, obsolete, transitive) To give up; to abandon (something, e.g. a job, contract)
   • 1888, Rolf Boldrewood, Robbery Under Arms, chapter 19, Google Books Not but what I'd had a lot to bear, and took a deal of punishment before he jacked up.
   • 1881?, Garnet Walch, A Little Tin Plate, Google Books Says I, “Let's jack up, man alive, / An' try further down on the Creek!” / “All right!” says my mate, “but we'll drive / Right an' left to the end of this week.”
   • 1900, John Strange Winter, A Self-Made Countess: The Justification of a Husband, page 201 alternate source “I don't think I shall enter for the Point to Point this year, because we're going to jack up.” “Going to jack up what?” asked one, while the others looked up enquiringly. “We're going to jack up the Service. […]”
5. (New-Zealand) To organise something.
6. (colloquial) To shoot, especially in the context of a poor shot opportunity.
7. (slang, transitive) To improve or embellish on (something).
   • I jacked up the recipes with some fresh ingredients.
8. (informal) To refuse to follow an order.
9. (informal) To criticize, discipline or reprimand.
10. (ambitransitive, slang) To inject a drug into (oneself) intravenously.
    • And I've had scag, I've had speed / I've jacked up until I bleed / So what, so what? 1981, So What? (Anti-Nowhere League song)
    • There is no good, objective, medical word for what I did next: I didn't depress the needle or plunge it down. I banged it in. I jacked up. I shot up. 2021, Ben Timberlake, High Risk:
    • He had nowhere to stay. I told him he could stay a week, but if he jacked himself up in the house, I'd kick him out. Heroin horrified me. 2005, Bob Geldof, Paul Vallely, Is that It? (page 89)

Forms

Relateds

jack-up-the-orchard · jacked up · jack-up

Synonyms

chuck up · discontinue · jig up · jack in · throw up

Translations (2)

it sollevare (con il cric) (to raise with a jack) · id mendongkrak (to raise with a jack)