the government's idea of poor and middle class and wealthy is completely off. They base it off the minimum wage which has never been adjusted correctly to account for inflation. This means most of the people that the government would consider "middle class" are actually poor/lower class as far as economics.
As far as suburbia defining middle class - not true. I know plenty in suburbia who are living way over their means (keeping up with the joneses). Equivocating a town, portion of a town to one strata is just ignorant, especially when you have alder suburbs that have poor areas/hoods and you have gentrification of city neighborhoods.
If I win a few million dollars in the lottery, I just jumped a tax bracket. In Uncle Sam's eyes I am part of that upper eschelon. Whether or not my counterparts in that strata accept me into their social group is another story and seperate issue.
This is a really interesting thread to read, because it seems pretty clear that attitudes towards class are drastically different in the US to the UK.
In the UK, class is something that runs through everyday life like Blackpool (or Brighton, if you're middle class!) through a stick of rock (candy) . Inescapable.
I would say that economic status is far less of a signifier over here than it appears to be in the US. Class here is dictated through things that are based more on personal taste, lifestyle and upbringing, such as the type of food you eat, the type of holiday you go on, your cultural preferences (music, films etc), sense of humour, politics, the newspaper you read, level and type of education, even your 'breeding' (although that's a term that I personally dislike).
Here, you can be extremely well off with self-made money, but still be clearly working class.
I guess this is because, we've had more history in which to diverge than you've had in the US, so it kind of follows that your immediate economic status makes more of a difference to how you and your family is/has been perceived.
Personally, I probably consider myself more middle class now (however inherently middle class people may disagree!), but my childhood was probably slightly more working class. My mum is from a large very poor, Welsh family, that worked the coal mines ('til they all got shut down), but my dad is from a fairly upper-middle class 'bohemian' family. We weren't all that well off when I was growing up, but we lived in a pretty nice rural part of the world after my parents did alright out of selling their tiny house in London, however we definitely didn't have the kind of money to do and buy all the things that a lot of my friends/schoolmates did.
I'm fascinated by class and it's effects on society, but that could be because I'm made up of an odd combination of working-class pride and middle-class guilt.
There's a great, funny documentary from 2001 about social class in America called "People Like Us" runnin this week on PBS.
It features a town where new, highly educated folks have created a food co-op - the only supermarket in town - and the older, poorer generation wants to be able to buy Wonderbread again; profiling a family of Black bourgeois; an old guy from a family that owns castles but he acts more like a hobo; a young kid who's mad at his mom for actin so 'poor' (she works at a burger joint and lives in a trailer); and games like "guess the class of people in this picture."
It's runnin this week on PBS on some stations. (In Seattle it is on this Wednesday night)
I have always wondered where the expression whitecollar vs. bluecollar comes from. I mean whitecollar is more of a suit and tie thing where as the blue collar is workers but what does the blue collar refer to?
Might be a stupid question but since Im not from the US I dont have a clue....
Class in the UK is maybe a less fluid thing than in the US. I mean do Americans talk about nouveau riche? In the UK I guess it generally means someone with newly made money who shows it and has social aspirations above their station, and it's a derogatory term used by people who see themselves at the top of the social scale. In the US, getting rich and bettering yourself is pretty much the definition of the American dream isn't it?
"Old money" in the UK and across Europe suggests at least a couple of centuries of serious wealth and probably from an aristocratic background. The US is a much newer country - what is "old money" over there?
Class in the UK is maybe a less fluid thing than in the US. I mean do Americans talk about nouveau riche? In the UK I guess it generally means someone with newly made money who shows it and has social aspirations above their station, and it's a derogatory term used by people who see themselves at the top of the social scale. In the US, getting rich and bettering yourself is pretty much the definition of the American dream isn't it?
"Old money" in the UK and across Europe suggests at least a couple of centuries of serious wealth and probably from an aristocratic background. The US is a much newer country - what is "old money" over there?
pre WW2 ?
nouveau riche?
after dot com's went bust, lots of nouveau poor too
but i'm just a white trash hillbilly lowering property values wherever i land
Big_Stacks"I don't worry about hittin' power, cause I don't give 'em nuttin' to hit." 4,670 Posts
Hey,
I was raised in middle-class home, but raised with po' folks values. That said, mom and pops were determined to raise self-reliant, hardworking, and responsible sons. A lot of "no's" came with the territory, and we were taught to earn the things we want. Before legal working age, here are some of the jobs my brother and I held:
-Newspaper delivery. -Babysitting. -Picking tobacco. -Cutting and trimming lawns. -Raking leaves. -Bagging groceries (for tips, mind you).
Absent from the equation included:
-Designer clothes bought by parents. -Cars at 16 years old. -Spending money handed out on a whim. -Miscellaneous parental overindulgence.
Although I couldn't stand my parents' approach when I was younger, I thank God for the way they raised me. All of the things listed just above, I ended up achieving on my own through hard work. This form of upbringing made me appreciate the value of a dollar and the sense of accomplishment that comes from earning something yourself. I teach college students now, and many of them are the most pitiful, overindulged, lazy, dependent, and pathetic people I have ever met. Their parents did them a disservice!!! If and when I have children, I'll raise them the same way my parents raised my brother and I.
This US/UK thing is interesting. As an American living in the UK, it struck me as strange that my man said he's a peasant cause his "grandfather was a peasant" and there's some pride there. I told him, in America, if you got money in the bank right now, that's what counts. There's working class culture in America but it's not something people are very visibly proud of. Obviously the lack of worker's unions and the ultra capitalism of the US (Unions are communist) has a lot to do with the the contrast.
There was a survey in the UK recently in which they found more English people are identifying themselves as middle class than ever. They also said (this is the funny part) that the people who consider themselves working class don't make but a few thousand pounds less than the middle on average. and that the folks who called themselves Upper Class made less on average than those claiming middle.
This US/UK thing is interesting. As an American living in the UK, it struck me as strange that my man said he's a peasant cause his "grandfather was a peasant" and there's some pride there. I told him, in America, if you got money in the bank right now, that's what counts. There's working class culture in America but it's not something people are very visibly proud of. Obviously the lack of worker's unions and the ultra capitalism of the US (Unions are communist) has a lot to do with the the contrast.
There was a survey in the UK recently in which they found more English people are identifying themselves as middle class than ever. They also said (this is the funny part) that the people who consider themselves working class don't make but a few thousand pounds less than the middle on average. and that the folks who called themselves Upper Class made less on average than those claiming middle.
buncha fake
come to think about it, every time i read stuff about the UK (for example, a biography of The Clash) 2 things seem to crop up.
1) the idea of what your test scores (those 'O level' / 'A level' things) are pretty much going to put you in a job category that you arent likely to ever shed. In US and A, its generally understood that if you kick ass in school, you are more likely to be getting a kick ass (at least well paying) job. but its not codified like in the UK, things are more fluid here it seems. a 1400 SAT? could mean all sorts stuff for you. but a 700 doesnt really mean anything specific for you either. I think in the UK you just test for certain fields you think you have a shot at, and then based on your score you are pushed towards jobs they think youll be better at. and isnt there a placement program of some sort at that point??
#2. the concept of trades. 'leaning a trade' and belonging to a skilled worker trade (i guess this is where the union thing comes in again) is stuff that goes waaay back to those uber old school peasant times. somehow the whole thing got short circuited in US and A, and today sons of farmers and ranchers are way less likely to follow in the family biz, and theres way less artisans/craftsmen/laborers that do a specific thing and stick with it now. miners, cabinetmakers etc still exist, but soooo much more stuff is imported and just generally done differently than in the olden days now - and it seems to me the US and A, for better or for worse, is leading the charge into a randomized future where people just do just about anything to make a buck, but thats more likely to be selling stuff on ebay than actually 'doing' something for good $. or maybe 'starting a small business' is the new 'learning a trade'????
My mom was a single mom and had me when she was 21, but she also graduated from Stanford. When I was born she was a High School teacher at Berkeley High.
When I was first born she lived with her brother and sister in Berkeley as they were still going to Cal. We moved to a couple other apartments before buying a house when I was 10 in the "suburb" part of Richmond, CA, which otherwise was a ghetto since declining after WWII.
Mom went to night school to get her M.A. and PhD, while my extended family took care of me. She moved up to running a couple Asian American organizations, to working at Cal, to Apple Computers, and then a professor at Harvard, and now runs a school district out of the Univ. of Chicago.
I now am part owner of a Duplex with my family with my grandfather living downstairs. Have a live-in girlfriend and 7 year old kid and finishing off my 10th year as a High School teacher in Oakland, CA, while paying off bills, bills, bills, and more bills, which REALLY fucks with my record buying. Oh, and grading papers all the time as well.
many of them are the most pitiful, overindulged, lazy, dependent, and pathetic people I have ever met. Their parents did them a disservice!!!
Does that come as a surprise ? They will end up with a paycheck that handles things for them.
Even parents who teach the value of money & hard working often forget the importance of being self reliant cause they wanna hang on to the kids that were the center of their lives for fifteen years. Throw in a divorce and things get even more complex.
Comments
As far as suburbia defining middle class - not true. I know plenty in suburbia who are living way over their means (keeping up with the joneses). Equivocating a town, portion of a town to one strata is just ignorant, especially when you have alder suburbs that have poor areas/hoods and you have gentrification of city neighborhoods.
If I win a few million dollars in the lottery, I just jumped a tax bracket. In Uncle Sam's eyes I am part of that upper eschelon. Whether or not my counterparts in that strata accept me into their social group is another story and seperate issue.
In the UK, class is something that runs through everyday life like Blackpool (or Brighton, if you're middle class!) through a stick of rock (candy) . Inescapable.
I would say that economic status is far less of a signifier over here than it appears to be in the US. Class here is dictated through things that are based more on personal taste, lifestyle and upbringing, such as the type of food you eat, the type of holiday you go on, your cultural preferences (music, films etc), sense of humour, politics, the newspaper you read, level and type of education, even your 'breeding' (although that's a term that I personally dislike).
Here, you can be extremely well off with self-made money, but still be clearly working class.
I guess this is because, we've had more history in which to diverge than you've had in the US, so it kind of follows that your immediate economic status makes more of a difference to how you and your family is/has been perceived.
Personally, I probably consider myself more middle class now (however inherently middle class people may disagree!), but my childhood was probably slightly more working class. My mum is from a large very poor, Welsh family, that worked the coal mines ('til they all got shut down), but my dad is from a fairly upper-middle class 'bohemian' family. We weren't all that well off when I was growing up, but we lived in a pretty nice rural part of the world after my parents did alright out of selling their tiny house in London, however we definitely didn't have the kind of money to do and buy all the things that a lot of my friends/schoolmates did.
I'm fascinated by class and it's effects on society, but that could be because I'm made up of an odd combination of working-class pride and middle-class guilt.
It features a town where new, highly educated folks have created a food co-op - the only supermarket in town - and the older, poorer generation wants to be able to buy Wonderbread again; profiling a family of Black bourgeois; an old guy from a family that owns castles but he acts more like a hobo; a young kid who's mad at his mom for actin so 'poor' (she works at a burger joint and lives in a trailer); and games like "guess the class of people in this picture."
It's runnin this week on PBS on some stations. (In Seattle it is on this Wednesday night)
I really recommend checkin it out!!!!
Might be a stupid question but since Im not from the US I dont have a clue....
Thanks,
Dress
"Old money" in the UK and across Europe suggests at least a couple of centuries of serious wealth and probably from an aristocratic background. The US is a much newer country - what is "old money" over there?
pre WW2 ?
after dot com's went bust, lots of nouveau poor too
but i'm just a
white trash hillbilly lowering property values wherever i land
I was raised in middle-class home, but raised with po' folks values. That said, mom and pops were determined to raise self-reliant, hardworking, and responsible sons. A lot of "no's" came with the territory, and we were taught to earn the things we want. Before legal working age, here are some of the jobs my brother and I held:
-Newspaper delivery.
-Babysitting.
-Picking tobacco.
-Cutting and trimming lawns.
-Raking leaves.
-Bagging groceries (for tips, mind you).
Absent from the equation included:
-Designer clothes bought by parents.
-Cars at 16 years old.
-Spending money handed out on a whim.
-Miscellaneous parental overindulgence.
Although I couldn't stand my parents' approach when I was younger, I thank God for the way they raised me. All of the things listed just above, I ended up achieving on my own through hard work. This form of upbringing made me appreciate the value of a dollar and the sense of accomplishment that comes from earning something yourself. I teach college students now, and many of them are the most pitiful, overindulged, lazy, dependent, and pathetic people I have ever met. Their parents did them a disservice!!! If and when I have children, I'll raise them the same way my parents raised my brother and I.
Peace,
Big Stacks from Kakalak
This US/UK thing is interesting. As an American living in the UK, it struck me as strange that my man said he's a peasant cause his "grandfather was a peasant" and there's some pride there. I told him, in America, if you got money in the bank right now, that's what counts. There's working class culture in America but it's not something people are very visibly proud of. Obviously the lack of worker's unions and the ultra capitalism of the US (Unions are communist) has a lot to do with the the contrast.
There was a survey in the UK recently in which they found more English people are identifying themselves as middle class than ever. They also said (this is the funny part) that the people who consider themselves working class don't make but a few thousand pounds less than the middle on average. and that the folks who called themselves Upper Class made less on average than those claiming middle.
buncha fake
come to think about it, every time i read stuff about the UK (for example, a biography of The Clash) 2 things seem to crop up.
1) the idea of what your test scores (those 'O level' / 'A level' things) are pretty much going to put you in a job category that you arent likely to ever shed. In US and A, its generally understood that if you kick ass in school, you are more likely to be getting a kick ass (at least well paying) job. but its not codified like in the UK, things are more fluid here it seems. a 1400 SAT? could mean all sorts stuff for you. but a 700 doesnt really mean anything specific for you either. I think in the UK you just test for certain fields you think you have a shot at, and then based on your score you are pushed towards jobs they think youll be better at. and isnt there a placement program of some sort at that point??
#2. the concept of trades. 'leaning a trade' and belonging to a skilled worker trade (i guess this is where the union thing comes in again) is stuff that goes waaay back to those uber old school peasant times. somehow the whole thing got short circuited in US and A, and today sons of farmers and ranchers are way less likely to follow in the family biz, and theres way less artisans/craftsmen/laborers that do a specific thing and stick with it now. miners, cabinetmakers etc still exist, but soooo much more stuff is imported and just generally done differently than in the olden days now - and it seems to me the US and A, for better or for worse, is leading the charge into a randomized future where people just do just about anything to make a buck, but thats more likely to be selling stuff on ebay than actually 'doing' something for good $. or maybe 'starting a small business' is the new 'learning a trade'????
im probably making no sense.
Although, my idea of well off compared to yours is probably a lot different.
My mom was a single mom and had me when she was 21, but she also graduated from Stanford. When I was born she was a High School teacher at Berkeley High.
When I was first born she lived with her brother and sister in Berkeley as they were still going to Cal. We moved to a couple other apartments before buying a house when I was 10 in the "suburb" part of Richmond, CA, which otherwise was a ghetto since declining after WWII.
Mom went to night school to get her M.A. and PhD, while my extended family took care of me. She moved up to running a couple Asian American organizations, to working at Cal, to Apple Computers, and then a professor at Harvard, and now runs a school district out of the Univ. of Chicago.
I now am part owner of a Duplex with my family with my grandfather living downstairs. Have a live-in girlfriend and 7 year old kid and finishing off my 10th year as a High School teacher in Oakland, CA, while paying off bills, bills, bills, and more bills, which REALLY fucks with my record buying. Oh, and grading papers all the time as well.
Does that come as a surprise ? They will end up with a paycheck that handles things for them.
Even parents who teach the value of money & hard working often forget the importance of being self reliant cause they wanna hang on to the kids that were the center of their lives for fifteen years. Throw in a divorce and things get even more complex.