meal ticket vs livelihood

meal ticket and livelihood both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
meal ticket	Yes	No	No	No
livelihood	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, livelihood is a hypernym of meal ticket; that is, livelihood is a word with a broader meaning than meal ticket:

Other hypernyms of meal ticket include bread and butter, keep, living, support, sustenance.

meal ticket (noun)	livelihood (noun)
coupon redeemable at a restaurant and entitling the holder to a meal	the financial means whereby one lives
a source of income or livelihood