# What is pay dirt? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 8, 2009, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049 "2009-10-08T14:45:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 2:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/1 "2009-10-08T14:45:18Z")
I saw the term used in a truck commercial recently and I realized that while I’ve heard about it all my life, I have no idea what pay dirt is. I mean in the original sense not as a metaphor for something valuable. What is pay dirt that makes it different from regular dirt? Is it a farming term? A mining term? ---
**Author:** ![Oy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/bc8723/32.png) [@Oy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oy)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/2 "2009-10-08T14:55:39Z")
I think it’s a mining term. ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/3 "2009-10-08T14:56:18Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > I saw the term used in a truck commercial recently and I realized that while I’ve heard about it all my life, I have no idea what pay dirt is. I mean in the original sense not as a metaphor for something valuable. What is pay dirt that makes it different from regular dirt? Is it a farming term? A mining term? It’s originally a mining (or at least prospecting) term. In particular the phrase often used is “hit pay dirt” as in finding the vein with valuable gold or whatever in it. ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/4 "2009-10-08T14:59:27Z")
Mining term, according to [Merriam Webster](http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/pay%20dirt). ---
**Author:** ![Philster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/13edae/32.png) [@Philster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philster)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/5 "2009-10-08T15:02:07Z")
Possibly… and I am only speculating… It is a mining term? 😃 ---
**Author:** ![the\_first\_supraliminal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f475e1/32.png) [@the\_first\_supraliminal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_first_supraliminal)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/6 "2009-10-08T15:05:26Z")
Or, I could make up that it comes from the practice of poor Greek patriarchs paying their help with dirt when the crops failed. This is the technique called folk etymology. ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/7 "2009-10-08T15:10:54Z")
I always thought it was oil related. As in, they just drilled through some dirt and found an ocean of wealth under it. Of course, I heard somewhere (might have been here) that it’s a [mining term](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=11641232&postcount=2) ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 7:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/8 "2009-10-08T19:33:49Z")
So the dirt itself has no value? The value is because there are trace amounts of precious metals mixed in with the dirt? If so, then hitting pay dirt seems a strange metaphor for finding something of value. What you’re actually implying is that you struck gold - all you have to do is get rid of that pile of useless dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/9 "2009-10-08T19:40:04Z")
Well, that’s generally true of mining, but especially true of mining for a valuable metal like gold. A gold deposit that’s worth exploiting – i.e., that will give you higher value in gold extracted than it costs to extract the gold – will mostly be “dirt”, and only a small part will be gold. ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/10 "2009-10-08T19:41:42Z")
There is a subtle difference in the implications. Striking gold implies an immediate payoff. Striking pay dirt implies that your efforts are starting to become successful. People swap the expressions, but there **is** a difference. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/11 "2009-10-08T22:44:57Z")
> [@](#): > > People swap the expressions, but there is a difference. Exactly. It’s the difference between a farmer saying he’s got a field full of corn and saying he’s got a field full of stalks. Technically he’s got both but in reality he’s going to be thinking about the part that’s valuable. ---
**Author:** ![Flymaster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c4cdca/32.png) [@Flymaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flymaster)\ **Post date:** [October 8, 2009, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/12 "2009-10-08T23:01:08Z")
Also, there’s dirt, which is worthless, and there’s pay dirt, which is literally gold. It’s not dirt at all, it’s pay dirt. Just like eye candy isn’t candy. It’s a compound expression, and dirt is not to be parsed separately to mean “brown stuff that the ground is made of” at all. ---
**Author:** ![RealityChuck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/realitychuck/32/195_2.png) [@RealityChuck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RealityChuck)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/13 "2009-10-09T02:34:25Z")
> [@the\_first\_supraliminal](#): > > Or, I could make up that it comes from the practice of poor Greek patriarchs paying their help with dirt when the crops failed. This is the technique called folk etymology. No, that’s not folk etymology, it’s an etymological urban legend (if it caught on). Folk etymology means that an unfamiliar word is altered to match a more familiar word. One clear example is “turtle.” The word for the reptile came from the French “tortue,” which was altered to the already existing “turtle” – the name of a bird. Eventually, to differentiate, the avian turtle was called a turtledove. Others of similar form include “haberdasher” and “isinglass.” It is a common and pretty understandable mistake. ---
**Author:** ![UDS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecae2f/32.png) [@UDS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UDS)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/14 "2009-10-09T02:44:26Z")
> [@Flymaster](#): > > Also, there’s dirt, which is worthless, and there’s pay dirt, which is literally gold. It’s not dirt at all, it’s pay dirt. Just like eye candy isn’t candy. It’s a compound expression, and dirt is not to be parsed separately to mean “brown stuff that the ground is made of” at all. Pay dirt certainly is dirt in the ordinary sense. It’s not gold; it’s dirt whcih contains a sufficient concentration of gold (or some other valuable mineral) to make it profitable to process the dirt to extract the valuable minerals within. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/15 "2009-10-09T03:43:40Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > Pay dirt certainly is dirt in the ordinary sense. It’s not gold; it’s dirt whcih contains a sufficient concentration of gold (or some other valuable mineral) to make it profitable to process the dirt to extract the valuable minerals within. Precisely. This is being overthought a bit – it is soil (usually alluvial, whether current or in a sedimentary deposit laid down alluvially) which contains enough of one or more valuable minerals or ores to make it profitable to process – “dirt which pays (off, to process),” just as **UDS** says. One digs through unprofitable soil in an effort to “hit pay dirt”, in both literal and figurative senses. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/16 "2009-10-09T03:50:20Z")
Added: As **Silenus** notes, in hard-rock mining, one “strikes gold” – a vein of rock in which gold has been concentrated, as a native-element mineral. “Pay dirt,” on the other hand, is from placer mining – the mining of unconsolidated sediments where gold or another mineral, having been eroded out of the “mother lode” (vein of gold that one might strike), has been concentrated by the action of sediment, as in sediments laid down at a bend in a river, or in deposits on the former course of a river. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/17 "2009-10-09T04:28:50Z")
> [@Little\_Nemo](#): > > It’s the difference between a farmer saying he’s got a field full of corn and saying he’s got a field full of stalks. And a field full of dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Serenata67](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/serenata67/32/10646_2.png) [@Serenata67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Serenata67)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 5:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/18 "2009-10-09T17:08:23Z")
Shoot, at Lambeau Field, they sometimes sell the sod. (And people buy it, sadly.) I guess that is literally pay dirt. ---
**Author:** ![Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/7cd45c/32.png) [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/19 "2009-10-09T17:09:28Z")
Didn’t Duran Duran have a song about mining terms? ---
**Author:** ![KneadToKnow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kneadtoknow/32/3999_2.png) [@KneadToKnow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KneadToKnow)\ **Post date:** [October 9, 2009, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-is-pay-dirt/513049/20 "2009-10-09T17:22:15Z")
Once. In the 1960s. For about 20 minutes.