I was thinking about this reading the ‘Eve Jobs’ thread: what on earth do people actually mean when they say ‘middle class’ and ‘upper middle class’?
Does not having to take out student loans make you ‘not middle class’ (or ‘upper middle class’) if, say, your parents established a college fund while you were an infant, or before you were born, but you live an otherwise ‘middle class’ lifestyle?
Does your job, or your parents’ jobs if you are a minor, make you ‘middle class’ or not?
Does it have nothing to do with money, and everything to do with attitude?
I’m curious what people think. I’ve of course used the term all the time, but I must admit I’m not sure exactly how I would define ‘middle class’. What a lot of people (at least here) seem to call ‘upper middle class’ I would probably call ‘professional’.
[I realise this could be debate territory, but I’d rather keep it a poll if possible.]
The line, IMHO, between middle class and upper class is the difference between having to work for a living and having sufficient wealth to just coast.
Upper middle class are people like doctors, lawyers, successful small business owners with high income. Upper class are people like Hiltons, Kennedys, Gates (but not just the notorious ones) with substantial wealth.
That is close to my definition, but I think the bar on Upper middle is a little lower. By both members of a couple making a good salary, a family can be Upper Middle Class. This is common.
Upper Class I would add the many many people who keep working but could retire. Pro-Athletes, CEO of large companies, Actors etc.
It’s not clear-cut, is it. I think that what it comes down to for me is income, though there are a lot of cultural factors associated with income. And of course the region of the country and the expense of living needs to be factored in. And one’s progress in life–there are plenty of clearly middle-class graduate students who are dirt poor, for example, living in studio apartments and eating ramen noodles.
A couple of years ago one television station or another did a documentary about class in America. If I remember correctly, there were five classes: trailer trash, working class, middle class, nouveau-wealthy (not necessarily obscenely rich, but living in McMansions and buying the newest electronics and Lexus SUVs), and old money.
My general ideas about middle-class, and I am definitely wishy-washy on this, with all kinds of circumstantial exceptions, is:
Reasonable expectation of going to a four-year university.
Own your home, if it is feasible where you live (for example, this is waived in New York City).
Have reliable transportation.
Reasonable expectation of promotion in your workplace.
Have money to save.
Have money to spend on entertainment, and to buy small frivolous things sometimes.
One moves out of the middle class when…
you own more than two homes for your own use (a vacation cabin at the lake is still upper-middle).
Individual family members own more than one vehicle.
An extremely expensive home is owned–a villa in Florence, a waterfront house on Miami Beach, a four-bedroom apartment in Manhattan.
Somebody is independently wealthy, doesn’t have to work.
There is a family business that the family duds can be shuffled into (a big business. A smaller one, like a restaurant, is still middle class).
From my personal experience, 90% of people view themselves as middle class and skew their definition of Middle class to include themselves. “Middle class” has strong positive emotional ties as part of the American dream. Being Upper Class has strong negative emotional ties for many people as being the snotty rich kid.
So people skew towards including themselves into Middle class so that they feel good about being there but don’t feel the burden of being Upper Class. (After all, as long as you are middle class you deserve a tax cut, it is the “rich” who can afford to pay more taxes and as long as you cling to the fantasy that your $200k/ year doesn’t make you rich, you can justify asking for a tax cut.)
BoringDad. The words “rich” and “wealthy” are often used interchangeably and incorrectly. Fact is, middle class is a very, very wide socioeconomic group. You moted how it gets skewed upward: it’s my opinion that it gets skewed downward even more, so that working class people making 40k per year in quasi-professions like teaching, media sciences and accounting can convince themselves they’re in middle class professions.
$200, 000 earned income per year for one person might make one “rich” after about ten years or so – assuming no other debts and assuming shrewd investments.
Otherwise $200K spent foolishly is just “high income.”
I wrote a big long reply, but I accidentally hit the ‘back’ button and lost it.
Here is the short version.
Middle Class Vacation: Hawaii. Caribbean Cruise. Paris when the kids are older.
Upper-Middle Class Vacation: Italy. Prague. Love the architecture.
Upper Class Vacation: Africa. Peru. Three months.
Rich Vacation: Visiting relatives in their summer homes.
Here, I’d say it’s if you’re not on any kind of welfare at all, whether by income or accomodation support such as state housing, you’re middle class. Lower class has various strata within that term, it’s not just one description.
And if you don’t need to work to survive, you’re upper class.
imho middle class is a state of mind. an individual can consider themselves to be middle class but someone else would not consider them middle class.
people who care about what class they are in will be much better at answering this question than people that dont. If however I HAD to catagorize people for some reason (like someone was offering me a dohnut) I would count people who do what they do just to survive working class, people who do what they do to advance their status and surroundings as middle class, people who started as middle class but turned out to be very good at it as upper middle class and upper class as something you inherit rather than work towards…
Hmm, it appears my perceptions are scewed a little low compared to most.
I’ve always figured Upper Middle class meaning:
You can afford a new lexus, jaquar etc when you have your mid-life crisis.
Own a nice hom in a fairly expensive community [frequently gated]
Can take a fairly expensive Vacation [with the family] once a year i.e. Paris, Italy, nice hotels all the way.
Your income, varying some depending on size of family and geography may pass 100k but certainly not by much.
Past that, you’re Solidly Upper class aka Rich. Congratulations. Past that, if you start talking about private jets then you’re stinking rich.
I thought we were talking about class, not money. Here’s the British/Irish version.
Lower middle-class: (the boss from The Office), the Buckets in Keeping up Appearances, Alan Partridge.
Lower middle management. Some tertiary education, not necessarily at a university, lives in suburbia in a new-build home, sends the kids to the local schools, wishes they could afford private school, wants to holiday in a villa in Tuscany, probably ends up in an apartment on the Costa Del Sol.
Upper middle-class: Friends.
Doctors, lawyers, accountants, bank managers, upper management, entrepreneurs etc. Live in a period home with period features, buy organic, send their children to ballet, know how to ski and horseride, went to a “good” university, might consider private school for their children. Holiday in that villa in Tuscany and a Chalet in Gstaad.
Upper class: Family money, a title or both- possible to be very posh and penniless, in which case they’ll rely on the charity of friends.
Live in a draughty castle or a large house in the country that has been in the family for years, also have a place in the city and at least one holiday home. Probably not very bright, but still went to a “good” private school and a “good” university- even if they sat at the bottom of the class. Works for daddy or a close family friend, because no genuinely marketable skills outside of their status and connections. Not only know how to ski and horseride, but also play polo and enjoy yachting- might enjoy bloodsports. Attend all the events of “the season” and spend holidays at their friends houses in the sunnier and more fashionable parts of the world.
$100k a year will not get you a Lexus, home in a expensive community and a vacation to Paris. $200k a year doesn’t get you that in most parts of the country, unless your expensive vacation to Paris includes budget hotels and a fire sale airfare.
I can tell you location does matter while you are working. By my wife and I both working jobs that pay well we are over the 100k limit you assigned. But a lot of that is housing, taxes, insurance and 2 kids.
We could drive expensive cars but instead I drive a 3 year old Focus Wagon and my wife got a Mazda MPV mini-van for 20,000 last year. We bargain shop all the time (except food shopping, we’re just not coupon cutters, one of our luxuries)
Instead of wasting our money in cars, we are saving for retirement and college at a high rate. We will probably be richer when we retire than anytime in our working life. We will retire to a less expensive state. We both think this is a good plan, hopefully it works out.
We are definitely not upper-class; we are firmly Upper middle-class by both being long in the Computer fields.
I’ll be the third to say that $100K a year doesn’t get you half as much as what you list. Mr. Athena and I make well above that. We both drive 6 year old cars who’s combined retail value were we to buy them new is about $55K (ie, 2 vehicles for WAY less than one new lexus or jaguar).
Paris, Italy, once a year in nice hotels? Maybe once every 5 years, and that’s stretching it. Nice hotels are pricey, as is airfare & meals.
We own our home, and it’s a nice one, but it’s not nearly what we’d pay for a nice home in a gated community in a larger city.
I’d say what you list requires more like an income of $200K (if you’re dumb with your money) to $300K (considering that you invest first, then use the disposable income to pay for all the goodies you list.)
I think my perception of “middle class” is quite different to everyone else’s here.
In my opinion, working class means you must work to live, pay rent, bills, eat etc (and that can easily apply to a doctor or whatever.) Middle class means you could stop working, and may have stopped working, and can still maintain a certain lifestyle, i.e., you are able to live on interest earned from your personal wealth. Upper class have inherited their money and have never had to work.
I agree that the definition does get skewed downward, for the reasons you state, but I’d be hesitant to call the occupations you mention quasi-professions. Even if you restrict the definition of ‘profession’ to mean only those occupations for which a licensing exam must be passed, I think teaching applies, as does accounting, if you mean CPAs. BTW what do you mean by ‘media sciences’? I think a big part of why this perception exists is the idea that if you have to go to college to qualify for a job, then that job should be considered professional, and hence middle class.
Death Ray, I think what you’re describing is a middle class that exists mainly in film and fiction. I’d say that especially in recent years purportedly middle class characters in film have been rising perceptibly, and would meet the qualification you state. The two versions of Father Of The Bride, one from 1950 with Spencer Tracey and one from 1991 starring Steve Martin. Both films show the title character visiting the prospective inlaws and being somewhat intimidated by their status and opulent home. However, in the 1991 version, his own house is nearly as grand as the inlaws’ house was in the 1950 version.
I will be the fourth to say that. Young people or those that have never had money don’t realize that it takes an insane amount of money to afford things that people associate with the upper-middle class.
Part of this perception is that many people are horrible with money and go ahead and do those things when they really can’t afford them. A responsible middle-class lifestyle includes saving for retirement, kid(s) college educations, and emergency funds, and maybe providing support for other family member like parents. Combine that with taxes, a mortagage, property taxes, and all sorts of insurance and that $100,000 is now down to 1/3 of what you started out with. That Lexus now appears (correctly) to be a whole year’s household discretioanry income. Nevermind all these expensive vacations.
My wife and I push the $200K mark with one child. We bought the mother of all fixer-upper houses, I drive a used car and hers was a work bonus. We live 30 and 50 miles from work, and we buy discount everything. Granted, we live in an expensive area but 100K isn’t a lot of money and 200K is just getting into the comfortable range IMHO.
Married college graduates can easily execeed 100K in most cities and two working blue-collar people can too. That is hardly a lavish income especially win you consider that income is expected to pay not only for yourself at that time, but also later, and to take care of others.