Cut-and-dried usage

The phrasal adjective cut-and-dried is often written incorrectly, usually as either cut-and-dry or cut and dried (without the hyphens)—for example:

A little over a week later, the issue seems a little less cut and dry than the social network had originally painted it. [PC Magazine]

. . . the facts presented did not lead them to a cut and dried answer for how to dispose of the dog. [South Coast Today]

It’s easy to make the first mistake (cut-and-dry). For those of us who are unaware of the expression’s origin, cut-and-dry makes about as much sense as cut-and-dried. The second mistake (cut and dried) is just poor punctuation.  

Cut-and-dried means prepared and arranged in advance or ordinary; routine. Its exact origins are mysterious, but it seems to date from the early 1700s, when it was used in roughly the same manner as today.

As for the hyphenation issue, in keeping with the rules for phrasal adjectives, cut-and-dried should always be hyphenated when it precedes the noun it modifies (as in the second example above). In these examples, the writers use cut-and-dried correctly:

It appears to be a cut-and-dried tale; noble activists and caring government come together to do something positive. [The Daily Star]

When I tell people that I study engineering, they often assume it is a cut-and-dried trajectory . . . [WSJ]

When the phrase serves as a predicate adjective, it doesn’t need to be hyphenated—for example:

“I thought it was pretty cut and dried,” said Ms. Long, who is a registered nurse. [NYT]