How to Use rat race in a Sentence

rat race

noun
  • The replies poured in — and not just from those caught up in the rat race.
    New York Times, 18 Nov. 2021
  • Salle Ingle is stuck in the same rat race as Kathy Ireland, and you and me, too.
    Ian Bogost, The Atlantic, 30 Jan. 2018
  • Philley and his wife were looking to avoid the rat race and stress of life in the fourth largest city in the country.
    David Taylor, Houston Chronicle, 30 Oct. 2019
  • The focus should be on wealth building, not incomes and the rat race.
    WSJ, 10 Aug. 2021
  • Alone time can be very healthy, so check out from the usual rat race and find yourself a spot in the slow lane.
    Tarot Astrologers, chicagotribune.com, 7 Sep. 2021
  • Ever dream of escaping the rat race, but feel too chained to your job or, more to the point, your salary?
    Jon Gorey, BostonGlobe.com, 14 June 2019
  • It’s a rat race in March between the gym, rehab and other projects like the one at the food bank warehouse.
    Michael Casagrande | McAsagrande@al.com, al, 26 Apr. 2021
  • Away from the rat race, the earth heals, the sun strengthens, water caresses.
    Vogue, 30 Mar. 2022
  • Musk has become their poster boy for a return to the pre-pandemic norms of the rat race.
    Christiaan Hetzner, Fortune, 27 Dec. 2022
  • That’s the funny thing about the New York rat race—everybody is dying to compete and no one can win.
    Sam Sacks, WSJ, 21 June 2019
  • And afterward, guests rested up and prepared to end the Milan rat race in style.
    Christian Allaire, Vogue, 24 Feb. 2019
  • Over seven years ago, Patty Kubeja moved to Kanab to get away from the rat race of living in Seattle.
    The Salt Lake Tribune, 14 Feb. 2022
  • Those who are willing to join the rat race often have too little time or patience for dating -- which, for some, is where the MBTI comes in.
    Jessie Yeung, CNN, 22 July 2022
  • In a city like New York, where life is often a rat race on steroids, King stands apart because warmth, style, and artfulness abound there.
    Kitty Greenwald, Vogue, 22 Nov. 2022
  • The pandemic and the Great Resignation destabilized the idea that workers must grin and bear the rat race five days a week.
    Chloe Berger, Fortune, 3 Aug. 2022
  • In his world, both the modern rat race and its antithesis seem equally tainted.
    Corey S Powell, Discover Magazine, 17 Feb. 2017
  • The whole thing about the general rat race, and people's values in life and family and work life balance.
    Jonathan M. Gitlin, Wired, 30 Apr. 2020
  • Tangping has emerged over the last few months as the rallying call of Chinese millennials who have had enough of the rat race.
    Washington Post, 5 June 2021
  • More freedom, more enjoyment of life, less scrambling in a rat race—maybe that’s the right direction.
    Peggy Noonan, WSJ, 23 Dec. 2021
  • Sure, trying to do it all could be unrelenting at times; but everyone was in the rat race right along with her.
    Trey Williams, Fortune, 13 Dec. 2022
  • These were low-level entry jobs with long hours and grunt work, but soon Horwitz came up with a way out of the ladder-climbing Wall Street rat race.
    Nathan Vardi, Forbes, 8 Apr. 2021
  • Then companies like Google came along and reinvented the rat race into something with purpose and, along the way, confused work with the rest of life.
    Arielle Pardes, Wired, 24 Feb. 2020
  • Americans who’ve pulled themselves out of the rat race of the daily grind in order to live as simply as possible.
    Andy Meek, BGR, 26 Apr. 2021
  • These anachronistic twentysomethings are proud to be the odd men and women out of the digital-recording rat race.
    Morgan Enos, Billboard, 20 Mar. 2018
  • Dallasites do not have to travel far to find a waterside escape from the rat race.
    Alyssa Fernandez, Dallas News, 29 July 2021
  • Mars is in your domestic 4th house, giving you the chance to clock out of the rat race and focus on any matters at home that might require your attention.
    Tarot Astrologers, chicagotribune.com, 22 Mar. 2022
  • That stagnation, Thiel claimed in his lecture at Yale, was linked to the credentialist rat race Vance and his classmates were engaged in.
    Simon Van Zuylen-Wood, Anchorage Daily News, 9 Jan. 2022
  • Ironically enough, for me, a great way to escape the the rat race involves getting into one of another kind.
    Rich Pope, OrlandoSentinel.com, 13 Oct. 2017
  • The cost of excellence This educational rat race also takes a heavy toll on both students and parents.
    Jessie Yeung, CNN, 1 July 2023
  • His livelihood being beholden to an oppressive boss and the 9 to 5 rat race like his struggling mother, Cissy Saint (Micheal Hyatt), was tantamount to death.
    Keith Nelson, Men's Health, 20 Apr. 2023

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'rat race.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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