What's the meaning and usage of ~マシだ


I keep hearing this phrase

> .... マシだ

Apparently it means something along the lines of "better than nothing"?

For example in the drama 「結婚できない男」 there's a scene where the main character is
being suggested to help out his neighbor with a stalker and the dialog is
something like

> ミチルちゃんが一人でビクビク歩くよりクワノさんでもいた方がましでしょ（う）？

Is "better than nothing" a good translation or at least a good pattern to
match the phrase to? I find if I can find something I might actually stay in
English to tie a Japanese phrase to I'm more likely to be able to use it.




It means "better than something", but there are extra nuances that both
choices are bad ones.

If you want to say "A is better than B", you can say "BよりAの方が良い" or
"BよりAの方がマシだ". Both make sense and both mean "A is better than B", but if you
use the word "マシだ", there is a nuance that both A and B are terrible.

For example,

> 彼よりも君の方が良い。  
>  You are better than him.
>
> 彼よりも君の方がマシだ。  
>  You are better than him. (But he and you are both bad.)

