take someone to the cleaners
idiom

- to get a lot of money from someone, usually by cheating them

- to defeat someone by a very large amount

Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary

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WORD ORIGIN

The expression "take someone to the cleaners" is a modern version of the older phrase "cleaned out", which refers to losing a lot, if not all, of one's money.

In the "New and Comprehensive Vocabulary of the Language from 1812, James H. Vaux described cleaned out as something "said of a gambler who has lost his stake at play; also of a dupe (Betrogener) who has been stripped of all his money."

This likely originated from the idea of emptying one's pockets, which can also be referred to as "cleaning out" one's pockets. Thus figuratively speaking, if you take trousers to the cleaners, you first have to empty the pockets before handing them in to be cleaned.

Here are some other common "clean" idioms:

- a clean slate = if you are given a clean slate, you can start something again, and all of the problems caused by you or other people in the past will be forgotten

- to come clean = to tell the truth, often about something bad that one has been trying to keep secret

- to keep one's nose clean = to avoid trouble

- to clean up one's act = to improve one's behaviour

- squeaky clean = someone who is squeaky clean is completely good and honest and never does anything bad

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SYNONYMS

to take someone for a ride, to hustle someone, to rip someone off, to finagle someone, to stiff someone, to swindle someone

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Practice OWAD

"I hope that was the last time Jim will play poker. He was really TAKEN TO THE CLEANERS last night!"