You frequently hear the term “socioeconomic status” flung around when discussing the differences between Poor People ™, Middle Class Folk, and Rich Bastards. What does seem to be the case is that the term is a qualitative one - there is no concise graduated scale, either discrete or continuous, where a person can be mapped to a socioeconomic status rank (e.g. “Upper Lower Middle Class (Upper Division)”) based on some sort of arithmetic formula that accounts for net worth, income, education, criminal record, job history, etc. and pops out a number. What a person’s socioeconomic status is for a specific purpose depends on the context of what is being discussed. E.g. if you are discussing programs to help needy college students afford books, then the term “low socioeconomic status” means “poor enough to need help affording books”. Likewise, if you are a BMW dealer, “high socioeconomic status” means “rich enough to afford a BMW, whether or not they can afford a Ferrari”.
Are there any objective, quantitative measurements for socioeconomic status that can be applied across a large number of people, or against a person over time? E.g. instead of just watching the dollar amount of my IRA balance go up, can I set up a spreadsheet and watch my socioeconomic status go up or down slightly each month (but mostly up) as the winds of change bring raises, layoffs, further education (yay, another three credits!), home repairs (damn leaky roof cost me 2 socioeconomic points), job training (that class in Oracle database management gave me three socioeconomic points!)?
This is more or less what I’ve understood to be true in terms of how I see the term used.
For example, it seems that while increasing one’s cultural knowledge (e.g. by being well-read in classic literature, well-versed with traditional theater, etc.) is associated broadly with an increase in socioeconomic status, it is simply not the case that a homeless person can become Nouveau Riche simply by memorizing massive amounts of medieval poetry while neglecting personal hygiene and learning enough Algebra to get a GED. There’s a give and take there, and it doesn’t seem like one that is easy to quantify, e.g. by graphing a curve of diminishing returns showing that memorizing your first 10 13th century poems increases your Socioeconomic Status by a great amount, the next 90 by a modest amount, but beyond that, you get no additional status for memorizing more unless you also have at least 4 points in Math, 4 in Job Skills, 4 points in Income if you have a felony criminal record, 3 points if you have only a misdemeanor record, or 2 points if you have no record (unless you are gay, in which you need 3.2 points), and are at Housing Level 2.
For the “socio-” part, the implication is that a lot of people who are well off are in professions that require education. Obtaining a university degree often suggests a person has been exposed to literature not illustrated in panels; has encountered Shakespeare’s sonnets; may actually have encountered philosophy as a subject… although in most cases it may merely impact upon the surface. Similarly they have seen more information about the world than solely what’s carried on Fox news. They not only may have money, but the can carry on an intelligent conversation about intelligent things - culture.
There are exceptions - some people, like a certain Trump, seem to think a comb-over is the height of coiffure and wall-to-wall gold leaf makes anything twice as pretty.
So no, there are no fixed guidelines or dividing lines (as is very evident by the Trump example). This is especially true because you are judging on two axes; social/cultural and wallet power. Are you primarily judging on culture/social group, or money?
What’s the old saw about if you have to ask the price you can’t afford it? Well likewise, if you are not sure you are in a higher socioeconomic class, you probably are not.
A lot of quantitative work uses an indicator or two of socioeconomic status (SES), rather than trying to create some measure that captures every component of SES. Personally, I prefer to use a measure of educational attainment, but other variables that you could consider are income, occupation, father’s occupation, wealth, etc. (I tend to use education because most of the quantitative work I’ve done using investigating class differences has been looking at differences among mothers, and especially when we’re talking about women with young children, occupation and income are not good indicators, for what I hope are obvious reasons.)
One thing to keep in mind is that data sets are always imperfect, and the more detailed the information you want, the harder it is to accurately collect. Even if you could theoretically define a single measure of SES that encompasses all of the nuances we think of being associated with it, you could never collect sufficient data to assign an SES value to more than a handful of people.
Personally, my favorite theoretician of the components of SES and how they serve to function in society is Pierre Bourdieu, although I don’t believe he used the term SES. Bourdieu identifies four primary types of capital that establish our positions in society. Economic capital is what it sounds like - one’s ability buy stuff. Cultural capital is a fuzzier concept, and is essentially the degree to which you understand what are “appropriate” behavior and preferences for your cultural milieu. Social capital is a function of the size of your social network and the usefulness of your connections. Finally, symbolic capital is terribly confusing and basically refers to political power. There are broad research areas within the social sciences that attempt to measure different types of capital within this theoretical framework.
For the record, I would not interpret fixing your roof as negatively affecting your SES in any way. Rather, displaying the understanding that it is appropriate to have one’s house in good repair, having the know-how to either fix your roof your self or being able to find someone to do it for you, having the economic capital to make it happen - those are all good SES things. If you spent the same money on hookers and blow, then your SES would likely take a hit.
There’s also sexual/erotic capital, a measure of the amount of social power you wield by virtue of having various qualities that your culture considers sexually attractive. What specific traits boost it for you vary by time and place, obviously. In addition to giving you the clout to attract the more desirable mate(s) in the area, it also comes into play in non-sexual personal interactions. Greatly simplified, in the absence of pertinent information (and sometimes despite information to the contrary), attractive people are generally assumed to be nicer, more competent, more successful, etc.
This one works slightly backwards as compared to the others, though – often it’s what people of high SES aspire to or display that dictates specific characteristics that make someone “attractive”. When only the rich and powerful could afford to live without spending all day outside doing backbreaking work, for example, pale skin contributed to erotic capital; after the Industrial Revolution hit, the poor worked in factories and the rich had the time to lie out in the sun, and tans were suddenly sexy.
Good point, but what I meant is that having a damaged roof would theoretically lower your SES because it would constitute a “precarious housing” situation - you are on the theoretical road to homelessness if you don’t fix it. If you spend money or resources to repair the roof, the cost of the repair (e.g. money, equipment in your shed) comes out of the bottom line of your SES because it lowers your net worth.
Great answers everyone. What I assumed was the case is more or less what people put, but I was sort of hoping there was something analogous to, say, net worth calculations, credit scores, or university transcripts/GPA’s that could give your SES at any time.
But the scope of what SES represents seems to lend itself poorly to these types of calculations - a theoretical “Socioeconomic Status Reporting Agency/Bureau” would not only have to monitor your credit report, bank balances, and stock portfolios, but would have to cross-reference and weight that against your academic transcripts, job performance evaluations, street address (we <3 redlining neighborhoods), street polling (You sir! Do you think robert_columbia is a great guy? Would you vote for him for mayor? Trust him to take care of your kids? Do you think he’s rich?)
How much higher does your GPA have to be to balance out the fact that you are no longer on speaking terms with the Governor, you missed one mortgage payment, and your job was transferred from Manhattan to the Bronx? Two points? Three points? Five? If you instead wanted to balance out that loss of SES by owning a yacht, how big does the yacht have to be before you have broken even?