worth your salt
Meaning
Deserving of respect, pay, or a role because you are competent and do your job well.
Origin
From the idea that salt was valuable and once used as a form of payment (linked to Latin salarium, the root of “salary”). Someone “worth their salt” was worth the cost of employing them.
Notes
Often used to set a standard (“any X worth their salt…”). Common in negative form (“not worth their salt” = incompetent). Can sound judgmental or old-fashioned in some contexts.
Examples
-
She’s worth her salt because she always delivers before the deadline.
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Any mechanic worth his salt will check the battery first.
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If anyone on that team is worth their salt, they’ll mark the opponent’s star player early.
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A manager worth her salt thinks about how the decision will affect the whole department.
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Anyone worth their salt in this job questions the numbers instead of taking them at face value.
Grammar & Usage Notes
Usually appears as a predicate adjective phrase: “be worth your/his/her/their salt,” or in the pattern “any [noun] worth their salt…”. Possessive changes with subject (your/his/their).
Synonyms
- competent
- capable
- pulling one’s weight
- worth the money
Antonyms
- incompetent
- good-for-nothing
- not up to the job