Get fired up to learn the true story of this colorful phrase
Here’s Why Being Fired Is Called “Getting the Pink Slip”
Published on Jan. 10, 2025
It’s a pretty safe bet that recently—on your LinkedIn feed, in the family group chat and even at work—you’ve learned about someone losing their job. There have been significant job cuts across the tech, media, finance, manufacturing and retail sectors over the past couple of years. Pink slip’s meaning may as well include the phrase “it happens to the best of us.” And not to be a Debbie Downer, but further workforce reductions are expected in 2025, according to a recent World Economic Forum survey.
Being called down to human resources and learning that you’re losing your job is something we all dread. (I’ve worked in publishing for three decades; I’ve been there more than a few times.) Whether your position has been eliminated due to reorganization, downsizing or the company’s operations being moved to another state (yep, that happened to me), learning you’re “getting the pink slip” is no fun.
Speaking of that colorful term, what, exactly, is pink slip‘s meaning? And is receiving a pink slip a real thing—or was it ever? I talked to a language historian to find out the true story of why being fired is called “getting the pink slip.” Read on.
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Where did the term pink slip come from?
Per the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the original definition of the term pink slip was “any of various notices, certificates, etc., originally or typically printed on pink paper.” In fact, the first recorded usage, in 1901, was in reference to insurance companies notifying customers of rate changes.
Back in the 1930s, taxpayers were supposed to fill out and submit a “pink slip” with their income tax returns. And around 1938, we started using pink slip to refer to a registration certificate signifying ownership of a vehicle (a euphemism that still exists, though car titles are rarely, if ever, printed on pink paper).
Clearly, a pink slip is an important document, one that shouldn’t be overlooked.
What do pink slips have to do with being fired?
The meaning of the word pink slip goes beyond insurance. Its use as “a notice of rejection or dismissal, especially from employment or office” dates back to 1904, per the OED. It points to the first such usage in a 1904 typographical journal, which warned that “a revise proof to correct is regarded as a cardinal sin, for a ‘pink slip’ is charged up against the delinquent, and a certain number of these means discharge.” An example from the Atlanta Constitution in 1906 claims, “There is nothing like a prospective pink slip to fill the brawny athlete with zest and ginger.”
The saying continued to gain traction as shorthand for job termination, and by the mid-20th century, pink slip‘s meaning had become a widely understood metaphor.
Why were pink slips pink?
“We don’t know for sure why the slips were pink,” says Michael Adams, PhD, a professor of English and linguistics at Indiana University. “I think we have to go with a little bit of intuition. When an employer fires you, they want you to notice that. White paper is not the best way to get you to know, right? And red paper is not easy to type on.”
“What’s interesting about the pink slip is how bad it is, not what color that slip was,” he says. “I just have a suspicion that you wanted people receiving it to recognize it as a special sort of communication, that it wasn’t a regular memo from the boss.”
Fun fact: In Germany, termination notices are associated with blue; in France, they’re yellow.
Did anyone actually get a pink slip upon being fired?
There are tons of anecdotes of companies using pink slips to fire their employees, but none has ever been verified. The most common origin story claims that Henry Ford (yes, that Henry Ford) had managers place a piece of colored paper in each assembly line worker’s cubbyhole: A white piece of paper meant their work was acceptable, while a pink one meant they were fired. But alas, there’s no evidence to support that tale or any other theory.
“I’ve never seen a single one of them produce any actual documentary evidence from the time at which the word is introduced into English to verify what they’re saying,” says Adams.
Do we still talk about getting pink slips?
Though modern workers will likely never get laid off via pink paper, getting the pink slip‘s meaning remains “losing a job.” These days, when you discover you’re about to be unemployed, it’s probably face to face or during a video chat. The lasting resonance of the pink slip is surely due to its dramatic imagery—a simple, visible symbol of dismissal.
What are some other terms that mean the same as pink slip?
Though not as colorful (see what I did there?), here are a dozen other slang terms for getting a pink slip:
- Being axed
- Being kicked to the curb
- Getting benched
- Getting canned
- Getting cut loose
- Getting laid off
- Getting let go
- Getting sacked
- Getting shown the door
- Getting terminated
- Getting the boot
- Getting eighty-sixed
Whether you prefer “getting the pink slip” or “being kicked to the curb,” know that you have plenty of ways to express the frustration of being fired. And if you find yourself holding the metaphorical pink slip? It’s time to apply for bigger and better jobs.
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Sources:
- Michael Adams, professor of English and linguistics at Indiana University Bloomington; phone interview, Jan. 6, 2025
- Oxford English Dictionary: “Pink Slip”
- Cornell Law School: “Pink Slip”
- Investopedia: “Pink Slip: Definition, Term Origin, Employer and Employee Rights”
- Snopes: “Where Did the Term ‘Pink Slip’ Originate?”
- Challenger, Gray & Christmas: “The Challenger Report, Jan. 9, 2025”
- World Economic Forum: “Future of Jobs Report”: January 2025
- Brookings: “Should income tax information be public?”
