Decrease and Lag

noun

• A change downward.
  • usage: "there was a decrease in his temperature as the fever subsided"; "there was a sharp drop-off in sales"
  • synonyms: lessening, drop-off
• A process of becoming smaller or shorter.
  • synonyms: decrement
• The amount by which something decreases.
  • synonyms: decrement
• The act of decreasing or reducing something.
  • synonyms: diminution, reduction, step-down

verb

• Decrease in size, extent, or range.
  • usage: "The amount of homework decreased towards the end of the semester"; "The cabin pressure fell dramatically"; "her weight fell to under a hundred pounds"; "his voice fell to a whisper"
  • synonyms: diminish, lessen, fall
• Make smaller.
  • usage: "He decreased his staff"
  • synonyms: lessen, minify

• (v.t.) To cause to grow less; to diminish gradually; as, extravagance decreases one's means.
• (v.) A becoming less; gradual diminution; decay; as, a decrease of revenue or of strength.
• (n.) To grow less, -- opposed to increase; to be diminished gradually, in size, degree, number, duration, etc. or in strength, quality or excellence; as, they days decrease in length from June to December.
• (v.) The wane of the moon.

noun

• The act of slowing down or falling behind.
  • synonyms: slowdown, retardation
• The time between one event, process, or period and another.
  • usage: "meanwhile the socialists are running the government"
  • synonyms: interim, meantime, meanwhile
• One of several thin slats of wood forming the sides of a barrel or bucket.
  • synonyms: stave

verb

• Hang (back) or fall (behind. in movement, progress, development, etc.)
  • synonyms: dawdle, fall back, fall behind
• Lock up or confine, in or as in a jail.
  • usage: "The suspects were imprisoned without trial"; "the murderer was incarcerated for the rest of his life"
  • synonyms: imprison, incarcerate, immure, put behind bars, jail, jug, gaol, put away, remand
• Throw or pitch at a mark, as with coins.
• Cover with lagging to prevent heat loss.
  • usage: "lag pipes"

• (n.) A stave of a cask, drum, etc.; especially (Mach.), one of the narrow boards or staves forming the covering of a cylindrical object, as a boiler or the cylinder of a carding machine or a steam engine.
• (v.t.) To cover, as the cylinder of a steam engine, with lags. See Lag, n., 4.
• (a.) Last made; hence, made of refuse; inferior.
• (n.) One who lags; that which comes in last.
• (a.) Coming tardily after or behind; slow; tardy.
• (v.t.) To transport for crime.
• (v.i.) To walk or more slowly; to stay or fall behind; to linger or loiter.
• (n.) See Graylag.
• (n.) The fag-end; the rump; hence, the lowest class.
• (n.) One transported for a crime.
• (v.t.) To cause to lag; to slacken.
• (n.) The amount of retardation of anything, as of a valve in a steam engine, in opening or closing.
• (a.) Last; long-delayed; -- obsolete, except in the phrase lag end.
• (n.) The failing behind or retardation of one phenomenon with respect to another to which it is closely related; as, the lag of magnetization compared with the magnetizing force (hysteresis); the lag of the current in an alternating circuit behind the impressed electro-motive force which produced it.

Payment of a financial obligation later than is expected or required, as in lead and' Lag'. Also, the number of periods that an dependent variable in a regression model is "held back" in order to predict the dependent variable.