In terms of

The phrase has been part of English language for hundreds of years, says Collins, and it certainly has its legitimate use. One can say with perfect grammatical propriety 'In terms of imperial units, he was above six feet'. The terms one is speaking of are literally terms.  But its freer use, a not-so-obviously-legitimate use extended to various aspects of the subject-matter, has been widespread only since the 1970s, and furthermore -- to my ears -- has grown markedly in the past twenty years. 

It's an extremely flexible way of combining ideas:  

1. 'He was controversial in terms of his choice of goalkeeper', instead of 'His choice of goalkeeper was controversial'. 

2. 'In terms of his policies, he was very successful', for 'His policies were very successful'. 

3. 'What the effect on the homeless, in terms of not knowing this?', for 'How does not knowing this affect the homeless?'

4. 'What is happening of late in terms of violence and burglary?' for 'What violence and burglary have happened of late?'. 

5. 'He's got to be better, in terms of getting back on defense', for 'He's got to be better at getting back on defense'.  

6. 'In terms of money, the car cost five dollars', for 'The car cost five dollars'.  

7. 'In terms of quality, this product is excellent', for 'The quality of this product is excellent'.

8. 'In terms of price, this car is superb' for 'The price of this car is superb'.

9. 'The city grew a lot in terms of population', for 'The city's population grew a lot'.  

10. 'In terms of food it was great but in terms of weather it was terrible' for 'The food was great but the weather was terrible'. 

But it has a flattening as well as homogenizing effect. It's lazy. Often it is substituted for a preposition or relative clause, as in 7, 8 or 9 (but sometimes it is vacuous, as in 6 or 10). I think -- as a rough guess -- what joins the more substantive cases together is that one seizes upon a single adjective, verb or noun (or phrase of same), but rather than fine-tuning it, with for example a preposition, as in 7 (call it a 'qualifier'), one says 'in terms of', then applies the main verb to the qualifier.  That fine-tuning often calls for some grammatical panache, an effort which is spared by using 'in terms of'. 

(Earlier, quick treatment of 'in terms of', at the end). 

Redacted -- unredacted

Is it just me? These are old terms but I don't recall their being commonly used until The Epstein Files. Now, whenever I run across them, I think of Epstein. 

We're investing record amounts in X! 

A pet peeve concerning politicians -- I have a zooful of such pets -- which is an easy dodge but no one calls them out on it. An reporter or interviewer states a problem, say an increase in waiting times for cancer-screening. The politician reacts by saying: 'That's why we're investing record amounts in cancer-screening!'  You see the problem? Say the NHS budget is set every three years. Say the UK infation rate was an average of 2.5% in each of the three years, so roughly 7.7% over the three years. When the politician spoke of 'amounts', it is not, you can bet your sweet bipee, figures adjusted for inflation. That way the politician say he was speaking truth, even if, in fact, the government's cancer-screen spending, correcting for inflation, has gone down in comparison with its level three years ago.