disparity

From Middle French disparité.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /dɪsˈpæɹɪti/

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disparity (countable and uncountable, plural disparities)

1. (uncountable) The state of being unequal; difference.
   • 1841 February–November, Charles Dickens, “Barnaby Rudge”, in Master Humphrey’s Clock, volume II, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC, chapter 12, page 301:

     With no great disparity between them in point of years, they were, in every other respect, as unlike and far removed from each other as two men could well be. The one was soft-spoken, delicately made, precise, and elegant; the other, a burly square-built man, negligently dressed, rough and abrupt in manner, stern, and, in his present mood, forbidding both in look and speech.

   • 2020 April 8, David Clough, “How the West Coast wiring war was won”, in Rail, page 58:

     There was a disparity of view over the use of diesel or electric motive power for the route south of Crewe, and the Prime Minister even felt a modern design of steam locomotives would be the best solution.

2. (countable) Incongruity.

• unalikeness