Definition of "employer"

The skipper Mr. Cooke had hired at Far Harbor was a God-fearing man with a luke warm interest in his new billet and employer, and had only been prevailed upon to take charge of the yacht after the offer of an emolument equal to half a year's sea pay of an ensign in the navy.

1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter X, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd.

the ideal from the point of view of the employer is to have output without employees, and the ideal from the point of view of the employee is to have income without employment.

1973, E. F. Schumacher, Small is Beautiful