close as wax vs penny-pinching

close as wax

adj

  • miserly, tight, or secretive 

penny-pinching

adj

  • reluctant to spend money; close-fisted 

noun

  • Instance of extreme economy. 

  • reluctance to spend money; thrift or parsimony 

How often have the words close as wax and penny-pinching occurred in a corpus of books? (source: Google Ngram Viewer )