What is an upper middle class lifestyle

In My Humble Opinion
21

Assuming you can afford to spend a bit more than you do now, without affecting your long term financials in a way that will matter, aren’t you being inefficient by not using the resources you have? Can’t you afford to upgrade the 16 year old vehicle, take vacations somewhere farther away, and at least stay in Holiday Inn Express or Marriott? (speaking from personal experience, there is a huuuuuge difference between a motel room that smells funny and is noisy and one that is spotless with good smell and clearly clean bedding. In a real hotel. Yet the price difference can be from ~60 a night to ~105 a night)

People who live frugally and sock money away for a future need they will never live to have are also as tragic to me as people who blow all their wealth frivolously.

Both are the wrong choice. If you horde money and live miserly until you die with millions in the bank, that’s just as bad as having millions and blowing it all on inefficient purchases like private jet trips and cocaine.

22

We don’t hoard money. We have less than the ‘recommended’ amount of savings for retirement. I have a nice computer, and an iPad Pro, and I built a nice home theater with projector and all that. I have a pool table in the basement, and we have a nice house with a nice view. I really don’t want anything else, other than gadgetry for my hobbies.

As for our cars, we haven’t upgraded them because we don’t want to. Once you get off the notion that you always need the latest and greatest vehicle and stop thinking about it all the time, it turns out that there’s almost no difference between a 2013 Ford Escape and a 2019 one. Certainly not enough that warrants a $650/mo auto loan. I went to the International Auto Show this year, and didn’t see a single vehicle I’d rather have, when the opportunity cost was taken into account.

It’s all about opportunity cost. The way to think about a new vehicle is not just that it’s new and cool, but that it represents $30,000 or whatever that you could have spent on many other things. One thing you don’t get even with an upper-middle class income is the ability to buy whatever you want without tradeoffs. If I buy a $30,000 car, that’s $30,000 that I can’t spend on other things I might want more. So before pulling the trigger on a big purchase like that, I’ll make a list of other things I could do with the money - buy a better computer, plus upgrade my telescope, plus going on a nice vacation, plus… Then I’ll realize that I really don’t want the car so much that I’d trade all those other things for it.

There’s also the ‘acquisition trap’ that poor or middle class people can get into - because their income is low enough that there are always things they want but can’t have, it becomes easy to tell yourself that whatever emotional problems you are having could be completely solved if only you had that thing you are obsessing about. Then if you finally come into enough money or a steady job so that people will lend you money, the temptation is strong to finally buy that thing that you’ve obsessed over for years - only to find out that once you have it, it’s really no big deal. Then you’re on to the next big thing…

A lot of houses in our neighborhood have speedboats or RV’s in the driveway in the summer. Working class people buy $75,000 blinged out Ford Raptor trucks on 8 year loans so they can afford them. Then they spend the next 8 years broke because of their $1000 truck payment, and the truck ceases to be anything special to them after a year or two. We made the conscious choice to avoid bad decisions like this. That doesn’t make us frugal, it makes us smart.

23

Aren’t your presuming that Sam Stone even wants those things? What if he simply prefers staycations over vacations? And what makes you think he only stays at cheap smelly motel rooms?

24

Super 8. I’ve stayed in many motels, and also the “express” type of hotels, and for me there’s been no comparison.

I can’t compare his value system other than to say, that for me, visiting foreign countries are intense and memorable experiences, while staycations are not. It’s the difference between a week with 100 new and unique things every day and some weeks that are the same except you relax more.

But, sure. If he thinks he’s being optimal and he’s actually saving at below the recommended rate, then he is being optimal.

25

Personally, I’ve had staycations that were memorable experiences and vacations that were a whole bunch of “meh”. Hell, if you’ve got enough disposable income and time, you can you can find plenty of “new and unique” experiences in your own backyard.

I actually think that’s what an upper middle class and wealthy lifestyle really gets you. You have enough resources to have a great time no matter where you are. None of the “well-to-do” people I know wait for “vacation” to live it up. They live it up every weekend.

Not everyone digs “intense and memorable”, especially if their jobs are “intense and memorable”. For lots of people, they’d rather spend their vacation sitting on a boat in the middle of nowhere, listening to crickets with a ceiling of stars overhead. I know, how boring is that? But it’s the life of Riley for many people. They’d much rather be out on a fishing boat than staying at a four-star hotel. You can’t say someone is being “inefficient” with their money if they are doing exactly what they want to do.

26

I mentioned Super 8 because I have been continually surprised at how good they are for the money. We stayed in one in Billings Montana that looked like a luxury hotel inside. I’ve spent a career travelling and staying in Marriots, and I’ve stayed in places like the Banff Springs Hotel. When I was a professional gambler I stayed at 5-star hotels, generally getting them comped or discounted. I know what luxury hotels are like.

See, for me I really don’t care about that stuff. I’d rather carry my own bags, and I don’t give a damn if there’s a nice folded towel swan on my bed or a chocolate rose on my pillow. Give me a clean bed and a decent room, and leave me alone. That’s pretty much what I like.

I also like ‘Staycations’, because one of my stresses has always been that I have many hobbies and can’t indulge them during the work week. Astronomy, for example, has to be done at night. There’s nothing I like more than a nice week where I can just focus on my own projects and relax.

I also like road trips. My favorite ‘vacation’ in the last few years was a whirlwind drive to Idaho and back over three days to watch the solar eclipse. 2600 kilometers of driving. It cost us about $500, including gas, and I’ll remember it forever. On the other hand, I spent a week in Paris and Eastern France, and hated every minute of it. I can’t stand pretention, and I don’t want to be coddled or spoiled, and I don’t care about fancy surroundings.

Having an upper middle class income does not mean you like or choose ‘luxury’. I just want freedom. Freedom to do what I want, when I want. Luckily, I don’t want much.

27

I agree.

If you’re in UK as I am and you can afford to send your child to university without them having to take our massive loans and come out 50k in debt at the end of it, you’re upper middle class.

28

Since you brought up value systems and what visiting foreign countries is to you, do I remember correctly that you went on a sexual safari through Eastern Europe, disbursing sums both for prostitutes and sugar daddy deals, racked up a lot of debt then posted a thread where you were considering whether or not to declare bankruptcy over that sexual safari debt? I think you may find most people have value systems which are compatible with Sam Stone.

I think it’s a question of diminishing returns for material vs increasing returns for social/existential goods. Past a rather modest standard of living, how happy you are is much more about the kind of relationships you have with others or with your own life than about maxing out your score in some planetary Monopoly game. People could experience happiness before the latest iPhone and 2019 Car of the Year came out.

Some people seem to have the same kind of relationship with money as bulimics, alcoholics and gambling addicts do to their poisons. It’s like trying to make up for a protein deficiency by eating more sugar. It’s going to feel nice for a little while but will only sink you deeper. I think it was JS Mill who talked about how humans can of course experience many of the more basic pleasures (and there’s nothing wrong with that in itself) but that focusing them even after they should be sated will stunt your development.

29

That sums it up perfectly for me also. When we moved here we looked at private schools, and none were better than the public schools in our neighborhood. Most were church schools, which were non-starters. I could buy a new car if I wanted, but what a waste of money.
At some point in our lives we have plenty of time but not enough money to do everything we want. Later we have plenty of money but not enough time. That’s where I am - even now I’m retired.

30

I think that kind of ties into what monstro said earlier. I wonder if at a certain level of income, you realize your time is more valuable than money and you start hiring people to do things for you so you have more free time.

If there are non-financial dividers between classes (aside from things like education), I’d say thats one of the dividers between middle class vs upper middle class, when you realize your time is more important than money (because you have more than enough money) so you start hiring landscapers, cooks, cleaners, nannies, tutors, etc. freely.

31

There’s that - but there’s also the fact that rents are different in different neighborhoods ( $3K in some neighborhoods gets you a studio - in my neighborhood it gets you three bedrooms and some change) and also that lifestyles are very different in different places. Right now , I live in Queens. I own my 3 BR house which I bought 31 years ago and two cars. If my income suddenly doubled, I would sell the house , ditch the cars and buy a one or two bedroom apartment in Manhattan. Because I don’t need three bedrooms for me and my husband and I won’t need cars in Manhattan.

That 5 bedroom home - there aren’t that many of them in NYC. I myself have never seen one- the closest it gets is a three bedroom house that has had a fourth bedroom added in the basement or attic… I’m sure there are some- but if I see a listing for a house with 5 or 6 or more bedrooms, it’s almost always a multiple dwelling. (it is very common for people to buy a two or three family house and rent out the other units - something that I’ve only seen in urban areas) ) Are houses smaller and more expensive than those in other places- absolutely. I just got back today from visiting my brother-in-law in Rochester - his house is twice as big as mine, he has four times as much property and it’s worth half as much as mine is.

But people with $1M a year in income can’t be excluded from the upper middle class simply because they live in a 3BR Manhattan apartment and don’t own cars. They could certainly afford a 5 bedroom house and a couple of cars somewhere in the area, but they have decided that not only is their time worth something, so is the location.

32

I don’t think you can exclude age and savings from the equation. You aren’t upper middle class unless there’s a high probability that you’ll retain a similar lifestyle once retired. Not identical, necessarily, but not having to eat cat food.

The youth are going to have to save a higher fraction of their income for retirement. The older generations have been irresponsible and failed to repay what they took. There is also more uncertainty about the global economy and even the state of civilization.

An older household that makes good money now but is close to retirement and has failed to save for it is also not upper middle class. Maybe that’s because their jobs didn’t pay well until recently or maybe they were irresponsible with their money, but either way, if they have to sell their house and lower their standard of living just to make ends meet, they shouldn’t be counted in the upper middle class.

33

I’m definitely not an economist, and unlikely to ever have much experience with an upper middle class income, but I’ll throw in the two pennies I can spare:

I think it’s important to note the difference between an UMC lifestyle and being (economically) upper middle class.

The lifestyle might well include a large home, a fancy car or two, private school, hired help, and a couple of high end vacations every year. Nouveau riche.

But that’s not the economics. You might well be a high earner, happily driving your 15 year old Subaru home to your modest bungalow every day. Spending and earning are very different functions.

(The OP reminded me of a set of questions from my daughter as she completed a homework assignment for Econ 1101 last semester. She was instructed to figure out the net worth of a family, and compare it to income, so I was the obvious source to ask nosy financial questions. And we are struggling. Disabled husband, two kids in college, two in elementary school. We aren’t able to help the big kids much, but we do pay for phones and car insurance, and provided both with reasonable used cars.

However, because we have a very modest amount of debt - currently about $5000 remaining on the mortgage - and don’t mind driving an old vehicle, if it’s maintained, our net worth puts us ahead of the majority of Americans. Yeah, it’s a mobile home, but it’s on almost 5 acres of land that is appreciating fast. Yeah, both trucks are old, but they’re paid off. No, the furniture isn’t fancy, but none was purchased on credit. Our children don’t attend fancy schools, but we intentionally bought a home with access to good public schools, and a good university plus a technical school to take advantage of state funded dual enrollment for high school kids. We live a lower/lower middle class lifestyle, but I make financial decisions that are advantageous.)

Lifestyle, earnings, and absolute wealth are very different things, and I’m not sure that one can describe a class without factoring in all three.

34

I’ve long discovered that I’m a “2-star, family owned” kind of girl when it comes to European hotels. Part of that is that while 2-star, family owned hotels tend to tile or parquet, a lot of 3- and 4-star hotels have carpet, and I have a nose whose opinion about carpets is not printable. 5-star hotels are likely to have partial carpet over slippery floors. One of the reasons I like being able to book hotels online from sites with pictures is that nobody bothers indicate whether carpet exists in their hotel but you can usually tell from the pics.

From the point of view of my clogged nose and watering eyes, Marriott and Holiday Inn Express blow about as many pissed cats as Super 8. All of them have carpet, and “carpet” is just a 4-letter word with extra budget. For many people, the criteria used to decide what’s “better” isn’t necessarily the criteria used by those selling us whatever.

35

I work away from home; usually out of the country. I take advantage of weekends with nice weather (shakes fist at the rain falling outside, today is a bank holiday) to visit whatever place I’m working in. I also have a home in one of the most visited cities in the world (Barcelona), another up in the Pyrinees, and my closest relatives live in a small town that’s got a steady stream of international tourists year-round. 2.SiL works in our local tourism office; 2.Bro will “play guide” for foreigners who happen to drop by during the local Fiestas, sent to him by his wife. I remember that one year he had a retired couple from New Zealand, a Japanese family and a Canadian man along with their own visitors from Germany and France, and a Chinese friend’s own visitors from China. My staycations are other people’s exotic trips :slight_smile:

36

Heh. The father of a girl in my daughter’s barn was the founder of a company which IPO’ed, and he became rich. Helicopter to work rich. When he wanted a berth at a dock he bought the houseboat that was there rich.
He bought lots of toys. And his wife was responsible for handling the installers and service people and everything else. She did not want help around all the time to help her out. (I wouldn’t want it either.) She basically told him, stop buying stuff or I’m leaving. Or not dealing with it anymore. He stopped.

BTW the helicopter thing didn’t work out because it pissed off the neighbors and because his house was very near a small nuclear reactor. Mo money, mo problems.

37

Absolutely this.

I’ve been lucky to be in gainful employment since the age of 16 and have never bought in the aspirational nature of the upper middle-class lifestyle. When my wife an I had our first serious discussions about life together we both agreed that we didn’t care about big houses and fancy cars and expensive clothes and other fripparies.

We were very much of a mind that we wanted a house that was adequate for our modest needs, a little bit of garden but not much more than that. A car is a tool for us, it just needs to do the job. Clothes, jewellery etc. absolutely don’t care. I went out yesterday and spent £200 on clothes but that is the most I’ve ever spent in one go and it got me 7 shirts, a coat. two trousers, three pairs of shoes and boots, plus underwear. I am a cheap date and my wife is the same.

So by being frugal and modest when we don’t have to we have huge scope and freedom to do the other things (like holidays when we want and meals out when we want) that do matter. To look at us you wouldn’t know our net worth or debt levels or peg us as upper middle class and I rather like that and wouldn’t care much for that label anyway.

38

We are in the top 5% or so of US incomes and we do our own cleaning, child care, lawn care etc. We do take nice vacations a couple times a year and my wife drives a newer car. I honestly don’t care about material things too much. I’d rather save money, retire at a reasonable age, and then travel. The number one priority for spending is living in a place that is safe and has a good school system. Not to get too political but it’s ridiculous and not quite fair the disparity in schools.

39

This is how I’ve seen most of the world. There’s no reason to spend our own money when the job will get me close to many great things.

That doesn’t mean I’ve not taken the occasional, dedicated trip (e.g., to Barcelona or New Zealand), but I saw most of western Europe because I lived there, saw most of what I wanted to see in France because of business trips; ditto for Vietnam, China, Hong Kong, Thailand, India.

In Asia, we get five star hotels. In North America, I prefer to spend my own money on Motel 6 (for a single night stop) or Holiday Inn Express (if I’ll be there a few nights).

I’ll fly if I have to, but I much prefer a road trip if I have the time. Florida and back from Michigan is easy. In a few weeks we’ll drive to California and back. I’ve driven nearly every part of Mexico from Sonora to Chiapas and a whole lot of points in between. That New Zealand trip was three weeks in an RV, too.

I rather identify a lot with Sam Stone’s attitudes.

40

I’ll third this: I’ve come to the same conclusion. I’d add the caveat that UMC can easily afford to do some of the things on the “upgraded lifestyle” list: a regular middle-class family can afford to do a small amount of them but they need to watch their money to do so.

This does not mean that the UMC family does spend their money on luxuries, just that they can afford some without worrying too much about whether they can afford them.

And like you said, I have also come to the conclusion that upper class means you can afford all of these things without batting an eye. Which doesn’t mean that all of them do so, nor does it mean they’ll never run into money problems if they go overboard with the second houses and worldwide cruises.