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There ain't no such thing as a free lunch

popular adage communicating the idea that it is impossible to get something for nothing
Place adage Q167700
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There ain't no such thing as a free lunch

Summary

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch is an adage[1]. It draws 501 Wikipedia views per month (adage category, ranking #8 of 19).[2]

Key Facts

  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's instance of is recorded as adage[3].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's instance of is recorded as Epigrammatic law[4].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's coat of arms image is recorded as Tanstaafl.jpg[5].
  • free lunch is named after There ain't no such thing as a free lunch[6].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's Commons category is recorded as There's no such thing as a free lunch (TINSTAAFL)[7].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's Freebase ID is recorded as /m/012byp[8].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's main subject is recorded as trade-off[9].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's OmegaWiki Defined Meaning is recorded as 1251945[10].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's Encyclopedia of Science Fiction ID is recorded as heinleins_law[11].
  • There ain't no such thing as a free lunch's Microsoft Academic ID is recorded as 2777483939[12].

Body

Designation and Status

Recorded instance of include adage[3] and Epigrammatic law[4].

History and Context

free lunch is named after There ain't no such thing as a free lunch[6].

Why It Matters

There ain't no such thing as a free lunch draws 501 Wikipedia views per month (adage category, ranking #8 of 19).[2] It has Wikipedia articles in 18 language editions, a strong signal of global cultural recognition.[13] It is known by 17 alternative names across languages and contexts.[14]

References

Programmatic citations — every numbered marker resolves to a verifiable graph row below.

Direct Wikidata claims

  1. [3] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  2. [4] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  3. [5] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  4. [6] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  5. [7] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  6. [8] ↑ . Freebase Data Dumps. wikidata.org.
  7. [9] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  8. [10] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  9. [11] ↑ . wikidata.org.
  10. [12] ↑ . wikidata.org.

Class ancestry

  1. [1] ↑ . Wikidata. wikidata.org.

Aggregate / graph-position facts

  1. [2] ↑ . Wikimedia Foundation. dumps.wikimedia.org.
  2. [13] ↑ . Wikidata sitelinks. wikidata.org.
  3. [14] ↑ . Wikidata aliases. wikidata.org.

📑 Cite this page

Use these citations when quoting this entity in research, articles, AI prompts, or wherever provenance matters. We aggregate Wikidata + Wikipedia + authoritative open-data sources; the stitched, scored, cross-referenced view is what 4ort.xyz contributes.

APA 4ort.xyz Knowledge Graph. (2026). There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. Retrieved May 3, 2026, from https://4ort.xyz/entity/there-ain-t-no-such-thing-as-a-free-lunch
MLA “There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.” 4ort.xyz Knowledge Graph, 4ort.xyz, 3 May. 2026, https://4ort.xyz/entity/there-ain-t-no-such-thing-as-a-free-lunch.
BibTeX @misc{4ortxyz_there-ain-t-no-such-thing-as-a-free-lunch_2026, author = {{4ort.xyz Knowledge Graph}}, title = {{There ain't no such thing as a free lunch}}, year = {2026}, url = {https://4ort.xyz/entity/there-ain-t-no-such-thing-as-a-free-lunch}, note = {Accessed: 2026-05-03}}
LLM prompt According to 4ort.xyz Knowledge Graph (aggregator of Wikidata, Wikipedia, and authoritative open-data sources): There ain't no such thing as a free lunch — https://4ort.xyz/entity/there-ain-t-no-such-thing-as-a-free-lunch (retrieved 2026-05-03)

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