Cliche of the Week 80 – Deep Pockets

Deep pockets are desperately needed to fix financial woes resistant to most normal forms of treatment.

But those who have money in secret compartments sewn into their smart clothes first have to be persuaded to dig deep.

These pockets appear in mainstream news reports around the world at a rate of about 700 a month, up from about 200 two years ago.

Most, but not all, of the references are in business news, where money is nearly always the main story.

"The latest chapter in what residents call a David v Goliath battle against a corporation with deep pockets" (The New York Times, February 10).

"Hedge funds or others with deep pockets could provide some support, but it will come at a cost" (Dow Jones International News, January 25).

"Two octogenarian legends of the turf are likely to become the centre of attention at next week's 2012 Karaka Yearling Sale, one with an uncanny eye for horseflesh and the other with deep pockets." (The New Zealand Herald, January 28).

The plan of an obviously overpaid footballer for a four-storey, 25,000-litre aquarium: "To maintain a decorative feature like this without letting it ruin your life requires very deep pockets indeed. And you don't even get to eat the fish." (The Guardian, February 21).

Cliche of the Week appears in The Australian newspaper Mondays. Cliches in the media are tracked across the world using Factiva and Dow Jones Insight.

Chris Pash's book, The Last Whale, a true story set in the 1970s, was published by Fremantle Press in 2008.