penny-wiseadj.

1598 F. Meres tr. Luis de Granada Sinners Guyde ii. ii. xvii. 490 Least he (as it is wont to be sayd) be penny wise and pound foolish, least he I say, gather ashes, and cast away flower.

1600 R. C. Godlie Househ. Govt. 269 This is (as the common saying is) to be penny-wise, and pound-foolish: to saue a sticke, and burne a house.

1607 E. Topsell Hist. Foure-footed Beastes 609 If by couetousnesse or negligence, one withdraw from them their ordinary foode, he shall be penny wise, and pound foolish: that is, suffer a great losse in his cattell, for sauing from them a little meate.

1612 F. Bacon Ess. (new ed.) 129 Be not penny-wise; Riches have winges; & sometimes they fly away of themselves.

1712 J. Addison Spectator No. 295. ¶6 I think a Woman who will give up her self to a Man in Marriage, where there is the least room for such an Apprehension,..may very properly be accused..of being Penny wise and Pound foolish.

1795 M. Edgeworth Lett. for Lit. Ladies 68 Economy is not the mean, penny-wise and pound foolish policy.

1842 W. M. Thackeray Miss Löwe in Wks. (1886) 272 What a miserable penny-wise economist you have been!

1872 ‘G. Eliot’ Middlemarch III. lviii. 293 If anyone had suggested a saving on a particular article..it would have appeared to him simply a penny-wise, mean notion.

1900 J. Conrad Lord Jim iii. 23 That's what you Germans call economy. Penny wise, pound foolish.

1937 Life 13 Sept. 8/1 (advt.) Penny-wise Mr. A made a slight saving by buying ‘cheap’ paint.

1977 S. Wales Guardian 27 Oct. 1/3 The Education Committee was being penny wise and pound foolish by giving some contracts to small private contractors running on a shoe-string budget and using non-union labour.

1999 C. Mendelson Home Comforts lvii. 671/1 Linen stores once expected their patrons to be knowledgeable, penny-wise women who would pore over merchandise with sharp eyes.