Hyphens can be a little tricky, but they are important. For example, there is a world of difference between a dirty-movie theater and a dirty movie theater. You probably wouldn’t want to go to either one, but there is a big difference between the two.
Hyphens are tricky because location is also very important in determining whether or not you need to hyphenate words.
The rule is pretty clear, however. When you have two or more words that modify or describe a noun that follows, you should hyphenate those words. You should not hyphenate the same words if they come after the noun.
Take a look at the following example where hyphenation errors exist in several places:
Here is what the correction should look like:
If you need help figuring out where hyphens should and should not be, be sure to check out the Hyphen section in the Punctuation area of Grammar Essentials.