scrimp

verb (used without object)

1. to be sparing or frugal; economize (often followed by on): They scrimped and saved for everything they have. He spends most of his money on clothes, and scrimps on food.

verb (used with object)

2. to be sparing or restrictive of or in; limit severely: to scrimp food.
3. to keep on short allowance; provide sparingly for: to scrimp their elderly parents.

verb

1. (when intr, sometimes foll by on) to be very economical or sparing in the use (of) (esp in the phrase scrimp and save)
2. (tr) to treat meanlyhe is scrimping his children
3. (tr) to cut too small

adjective

4. a less common word for scant

v.“to make too small,” 1774, originally in English an adjective, “scant, meager” (1718), possibly from a Scandinavian source (cf. Swedish skrumpna “to shrink, shrivel up,” Danish skrumpen “shrunken, shriveled”), or from a continental Germanic source akin to Middle High German schrimpfen, German schrumpfen “to shrivel,” from Proto-Germanic *skrimp-, from PIE root *(s)kerb- “to turn, bend.” Related: Scrimped; scrimping.