<B>paymaster, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a person whose job is to pay wages. </DL>
<A NAME="paymastergeneral">
<B>paymaster general,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> officer at the head of the pay department of an army, navy, or air force. </DL>
<A NAME="payment">
<B>payment, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>the act of paying. <BR> <I>Ex. payment of debts.</I> (SYN) compensation, remuneration, settlement. <DD><B> 2a. </B>the amount paid. <BR> <I>Ex. a monthly payment of $10.</I> <DD><B> b. </B>money or other thing paid as wages or a price; pay. <BR> <I>Ex. What will he accept as payment?</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>(Figurative.) reward or punishment. <BR> <I>Ex. Baby's good health is payment enough for me.</I> <BR><I>expr. <B>suspend payments,</B> </I>to declare inability to pay one's debts; become bankrupt; fail. <BR> <I>Ex. Because of lagging sales and mounting costs, the corporation had to suspend payments.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="paymistress">
<B>paymistress, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a woman charged with the payment of wages. </DL>
<A NAME="paynim">
<B>paynim</B> or <B>Paynim, </B>noun, adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Archaic.) <DD><I>noun </I> <B>1. </B>a pagan; heathen. <DD><B> 2. </B>a Moslem; Saracen. <BR> <I>Ex. ... the crusader, who had sunk thirty thousand paynims at a blow (John L. Motley).</I> <DD><B> 3. </B>pagandom; heathendom. <DD><I>adj. </I> <B>1. </B>pagan; heathen. <BR> <I>Ex. A people ... a remnant that were left Paynim amid their circles, and the stones They pitch up straight to heaven (Tennyson).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>Moslem; Saracen. <BR> <I>Ex. Paynim sons of swarthy Spain (Scott).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="payoff">
<B>payoff, </B>noun, adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>noun </I> <B>1. </B>the act of paying wages. <DD><B> 2. </B>the time of such payment. <DD><B> 3a. </B>the returns, as from an enterprise or specific action; result. <BR> <I>Ex. You will see the payoff immediately ... without need for specially trained operators (Wall Street Journal). ... venturing from sixpence up in the football pools--and dreaming of payoffs as high as 300,000 pounds for predicting results (Maclean's).</I> <DD><B> b. </B>(Informal.) the act of dividing the returns from some undertaking among those having an interest in it. <BR> <I>Ex. the investigation of alleged payoffs by big Government contractors to officials (New York Times).</I> <DD><B> c. </B>(Slang.) anything given or received in reward or punishment. <DD><B> 4. </B>(Slang.) the climax (as of a story or situation). <BR> <I>Ex. Brother, I've heard some dillies in my day, but that's the payoff (New Yorker).</I> (SYN) culmination. <DD><I>adj. </I> of or having to do with making payment. </DL>
<A NAME="payola">
<B>payola, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) undercover payments or graft, made or given in return for favors, such as the promotion of a product. </DL>
<B>pay-per-view, </B>noun, adjective.<DL COMPACT><DD><I>noun </I> a cable television program service in which the subscriber pays a fee for each program viewed. <BR> <I>Ex. It would suit the owners--men who seem bent on making baseball a pursuit to follow on TV--if you can get cable and pay-per-view (Time).</I> <DD><I>adj. </I> of or having to do with pay-per-view. </DL>
<A NAME="payroll">
<B>payroll, </B>noun, or <B>pay roll,</B><DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a list of persons to be paid and the amounts that each one is to receive. <BR> <I>Ex. He never had to meet a payroll. Payrolls tend to grow and resist pruning and frequently politics substitutes for economics (Bulletin of Atomic Scientists).</I> <DD><B> 2. </B>the total amount to be paid to them. <BR> <I>Ex. a payroll of $10,000 a month.</I> </DL>
<A NAME="payrolltax">
<B>payroll tax,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a tax levied on business payrolls, and paid either by the employer or the employee, or both, especially to provide for unemployment insurance. </DL>
<A NAME="paysage">
<B>paysage, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (French.) a painting or drawing of a rural scene; landscape. </DL>
<A NAME="payscale">
<B>pay scale,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> range of salaries or wages. <BR> <I>Ex. These, then, the highest paid scholars in the land, attain a place on the pay scale equivalent to that of a colonel, at the bottom rank of the military noblesse (Atlantic).</I> </DL>
<A NAME="paysheet">
<B>paysheet, </B>noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> (British.) a list of persons receiving wages with the amounts due to them. </DL>
<A NAME="paystation">
<B>pay station,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> a public pay telephone. </DL>
<A NAME="payt">
<B>payt.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> payment. </DL>
<A NAME="paytelevision">
<B>pay television,</B> <B>=pay-TV.</B></DL>
<A NAME="paytv">
<B>pay-TV,</B> noun.<DL COMPACT><DD> a system of subscription television. </DL>
<A NAME="pazazz">
<B>pazazz, </B>noun. <B>=pizazz.</B></DL>
<A NAME="pb">
<B>Pb</B> (no period),<DL COMPACT><DD> lead(chemical element). </DL>
<B>PC</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>a patrol craft of the U.S. Navy or Coast Guard, a class of fast, small, lightly armed boats used especially for antisubmarine patrolling and reconnaissance. <DD><B> 2. </B>Peace Corps. <DD><B> 3. </B>personal computer. <DD><B> 4. </B>politically correct. <BR> <I>Ex. just a creed, a set of beliefs and expressions which students ... recognize instantly as "PC" (Newsweek).</I> </DL>
<B>p/c</B> (no periods) or <B>P/C</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>petty cash. <DD><B> 2. </B>price or prices current. </DL>
<A NAME="pca">
<B>PCA</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>Production Code Administration. <DD><B> 2. </B>Progressive Citizens of America. </DL>
<A NAME="pcb">
<B>PCB</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD> polychlorinated biphenyl. </DL>
<A NAME="pcl">
<B>pcl.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> parcel. </DL>
<A NAME="pcm">
<B>PCM</B> (no periods) or <B>pcm</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD> pulse-code modulation. </DL>
<A NAME="pcp">
<B>PCP</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD><B> 1. </B>phencyclidine. <DD><B> 2. </B>pneumocystis carinii pneumonia (a type of pneumonia occurring in patients with severe diseases of the immune system, especially AIDS). </DL>
<A NAME="pcpa">
<B>PCPA</B> (no periods),<DL COMPACT><DD> para-chlorophenylalanine (a drug which reduces the level of serotonin in the blood, used in research to treat conditions including intestinal tumors and schizophrenia). </DL>
<B>Pd.B.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> Bachelor of Pedagogy (Latin, <I>Pedagogiae Baccalaureus</I>). </DL>
<A NAME="pdd">
<B>Pd.D.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> Doctor of Pedagogy. </DL>
<A NAME="pdm">
<B>Pd.M.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> Master of Pedagogy. </DL>
<A NAME="pdq">
<B>PDQ</B> (no periods) or <B>p.d.q.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> (Slang.) quickly; immediately. <BR> <I>Ex. When he gives an order he wants you to carry it out PDQ!</I> </DL>
<A NAME="pdt">
<B>PDT</B> (no periods), <B>P.D.T.,</B> or <B>p.d.t.,</B><DL COMPACT><DD> Pacific Daylight Time. </DL>
