Definition of "jerk-water" []

• A branch line train, using light equipment (noun)
• Of an inhabited place, small, isolated, backward. (adjective)
• Railroads with low traffic. (adjective)

Wiktionary.org : Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License

• "But we do need it at the Federal level, because these jerk-water States will refuse to budge without it ..."
• "I vote for an even playing field for players playing every one else's format and sound files, that I manage not some jerk-water streaming lawyer trying to pump up market share."
• "He recalled shudderingly brother engineers whose wives dragged about with them, living on the edge of construction camps under canvas in summer, in rough-boarded, tar-papered shacks in the winter; or perhaps in half-furnished cottages in some nearby jerk-water town."