Definition of "inducement" []

• Something that helps bring about an action or a desired result; an incentive: tax breaks intended as an inducement to greater reinvestment. (noun)
• The act or process of inducing: inducement of sleep. (noun)
• Law An introductory or background statement explaining the main allegations in a proceeding. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "Another way of putting it is that in selecting a glass company for an insurance-covered repair, the consumer is acting as an agent for the insurance company, and as such an agent the consumer is taking a monetary inducement from a particular vendor to throw business to that vendor."
• "Because less than that is not going to offer them a long-term inducement to eschew nuclear weapons."
• ""What inducement is there to do it"? and so forth, and so on."