sliding-scale

Updated: May 9, 2025

It was known as the "sliding-scale," the tax on imported corn varying with the price in the market, rising when the price fell, and falling when it rose; the design with which it was framed being to keep the price to the consumer at all times as nearly equal as possible.

Charles Duke Yonge - The Constitutional History of England from 1760 to 1860

So far, then, from evincing a disposition to trifle with, or surrender, the principle of the sliding-scale, the Government have, with infinite pains and skill, applied themselves to effect such improvements in it as will secure its permanency, and a better appreciation of its value by the country at large, with every additional year's experience of its admirable qualities.

Various - Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 55, No. 339, January, 1844