Lower, middle, and upper class is such an antiquated way of dividing people into groups to keep them at odds with each other.
The fact of the matter is, there are truthfully only two classes. The working class, and the capital class. 95-99% of individuals fall into some strata of working class. If you earn a wage, a salary, or a commission in order to purchase basic necessities- you are working class. If your money makes you money simply by existing, and your assets passively appreciating in value mean that you do not have to work for a living in order to buy basic necessities, then you are in the capital class.
The working class and the capital class = The slave class and the ruling class.
It’s class warfare
Always was…
Most people are a bit of both, no?
Ideally, everyone would be in a position to break into the lowest strata of the capital class by the time they reach retirement age and can no longer work. For most people, that translates into a, IRA or 401k built over decades of years working, assets like a house appreciating in value (so that you can borrow against that increased value), and perhaps a pension or some other form of investment that yields dividends.
Even then. I’d argue that if you retire knowing that if you live within your means, your funds will last you for 20 years, you’re not actually in the capital class. It doesn’t matter for most people, because few people expect to be able to live for that long past retirement and they can always adjust their spending habits to push the number out a bit farther if it looks like they will outlive their retirement savings. But that’s just it, it’s more like a savings and not endlessly accumulating more and more wealth. For the true capital class, their money passively grows and generates more wealth faster than they can spend it.
Most people are living paycheck to paycheck… But if you mean owning stock or a retirement portfolio makes you a capitalist then I think that is still incorrect. People who actually own the company of whose stock you “own” can make decisions that will ultimately decimate your retirement savings while enriching themselves.
The GP earning 6 figures for prescribing boomer cunts opioids is clearly in the same social class as the construction worker whose life expectancy is below the retirement age.
The construction worker and the doctor have more in common with each other than either of them do with the billionaire.
That mentality, that the two working class individuals are too different from one another to ever unify because of the fact that one makes more money than the other, is exactly the kind of mental attitude that the wealthy elite have cultivated for years to keep us at each other’s throats instead of theirs.
There is no middle class. There are only working class and wealth class. Just because you are high earner in an office job doesn’t mean you’re not working class.
Where is the line though? Many people that could be considered middle class are realistically rich enough to never have to work again if they didn’t want to. But they want their flash cars and private school for the kids so they do need to work to keep that level of luxury. Even if they could still live comfortably without working.
If I was to start van living (hard as I can’t drive) and rented out my house I wouldn’t have to work another day in my life. Does that make me part of the wealth class, despite having always been at/close to minimum wage? Getting enough rent to pay for my mortgage and leave me with many hundreds extra would not be difficult. Go for a HMO and turn the living space into more bedrooms like a standard scumlord would possibly even leave me with over £1000 a month. The only work I would have to do is paint over some mould occasionally.
Where is the line though
The line is “do you need to work ever to maintain at least the current living standard”. That’s the division between working class and wealthy class.
If I was to start van living (hard as I can’t drive) and rented out my house I wouldn’t have to work another day in my life
Not maintaining at least current living standard.
A retiree couple that scrounged up enough to have ~$50k yearly budget for the remainder of their days falls into your definition of wealthy, and I would argue that doesn’t line up. They are not, in fact, wealthy. The ‘line’ is far less clear than that.
Yup. Our family grew 5 years ago so we needed a bigger house. Well, didn’t “need” but would have to remodel the old to accommodate. We were within our means before moving. Still are in the new house but budget is a lot tighter than it was in the bigger house. Didn’t realize until hindsight that “bigger house, bigger (more expensive) problems” would occur.
We could move again and make a good profit on the house now, but I see it as an asset for future income down the road, although as my parents and aquantisces parents age, I’m learning more and more that at least in the USA, they take everything you’ve worked for away from you once you can slave no more. I’m going to do my best to protect my assets for my family before it comes to that.
Hopefully you at least have a will, but I would urge you to look at establishing a living trust as well.
Yeah, both are on the list but kids take a lot of time away! We have a hefty life insurance policy right now at least. I know trust needs established for at least 5 years to be considered enforceable.
kids take a lot of time away!
Honestly yeah, I feel you. Can’t even get my dishes done lol
So if I was already living in a van I would be wealthy?
When compared to other people living in vans? Absolutely.
The line is “do you need to work ever to maintain at least the current living standard”
The answer would be “no” for most europeans. Cost of living in asia is around 400EUR a month, with a higher living standard. Most europeans could achieve that easily.
I don’t know why everyone is avoiding the Marxist terms, as they are far more accurate than low/middle/upper or whatever people are talking about in this thread.
Those wealthy workers are petit-bourgeoisie. They own enough capital so that they no longer have to struggle in the rat race of capitalism, but not enough to be controlling entire industries or multibillion dollar companies like the bourgeoisie.
Initially wanted to say petit bourgeoisie isn’t the right term here but now the more I think about it, yeah?
It doesn’t really fit the normal examples of petit bourgeoisie but economically I think they are in the same place even if they are not small business owners or sole traders.
I thought petit-bourgeois made their money through assets? So they aren’t workers. High earners are still proletariat if they are selling their labor.
pretty easy. if you had a million in the bank at 4% return you’d have a income of 40K a year. if you could live on that income you’d be all set and not have to work.
so scale that up a bit, say 5 million in the bank at 5% return, that would be an income of 250,000K a year.
but the issue is people’s spending scales with their income/wealth, and most people spend more than they make so they are constantly seeking greater wealth.
That’s only part of the story. Seeking more wealth to spend more is not healthy in my opinion but humanly understandable.
There is an inflection point, I don’t know what level of wealth brings it, but after that it is not about earning more to spend more, it’s just growing your wealth for the sake of growing it. It becomes a game of increasing some numbers at the expense of everybody else.
Right, but someone living comfortably on the interest of £1m, are we really calling them part of the wealthy class, but not someone who works for a 6 figure salary and has more wealth than the first guy while living in more luxury?
it’s relative to where you live and your lifestyle expectations.
where i live people make 300K a year and feel impoverished. if you go three hours away, making 30K a year is a good salary.
I make 150K a year, so to 25 year olds working for 15/hr i’m rich. but to many of my peers i’m living in poverty because I don’t have ten million in the bank.
there are some objective measure, for sure, but people’s lifestyles are radically different. the MIT cost of living calculator for my city is like 80K, but most everyone who lives here would consider that a poverty level wage.
how expensive it is to be poor
For anyone that needs the read, Terry Pratchett said it so well it is an economic theory now, the Boots theory.
The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. … A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. … But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that’d still be keeping his feet dry in ten years’ time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.
This was the Captain Samuel Vimes ‘Boots’ theory of socio-economic unfairness.[4]From Men at Arms by Sir Terry Pratchett
Also, a history of “people don’t want to work” bullshit going back to 1894: https://thunderdungeon.com/2024/07/14/nobody-wants-to-work-anymore/
People don’t want to work and are lazy is a bullshit talking point even older than 1894.
The first ever modern self-help book ever published (literally called self-help) was made a man with a lifelong history of business and financial failure and yet also still believed that it was no legislation or social assistance, but personal ‘morals’ and ethics are what gets people out of poverty and into comfort.
It was bullshit then and bullshit now. It is such a dark realization that what causes so much quality of life increases is not productivity or technology but legislation and policy.
It is such a dark realization that what causes so much quality of life increases is not productivity or technology but legislation and policy.
And that’s how we got Prosperity Gospel: rich folk trying to justify their lazy asses hoarding wealth and complaining about the people who actually do the work wanting fair compensation for their time and effort.
Prosperity Gospel is a bit older than that. There was a time when people thought that being rich or becoming rich was a direct blessing from god… ironically the people who really first disputed that in Europe were the Dutch, whose trade and double-entry accounting laid the foundation of modern capitalism.
I should mention that in 1001 Arabian Nights, at least in the story of Sinbad the Sailor, Sinbad (as an old man telling his story to a young man coincidentally named Sinbad as well) that his fortune was more luck than anything. At least he acknowledged that.
In general it can be said that poor people do not have the capital to make upfront investments which become profitable over time. Not even just literal investing, but investing in things like a more fuel efficient car, upgrading the insulation in your house/apartment to save on heating, buying non-perishables in bulk when there’s a good deal, buying a dish washer instead of hand washing…
So many things that let you save tons of money in the long run, require relatively large upfront investments, that poor people can’t afford. That’s a big reason why poverty can be such an insidious vicious loop, that can be extremely hard to escape from.
Two identical households, with identical income could have vastly different financial situations, just based on if their income was previously low, and they weren’t able to afford any of these investments, vs. If their income was previously high, having allowed them to previously make these large investments to reduce their long term monthly costs, and secure enough liquidity to be able to continue occasionally making these investments.
Thank you for the expansion.
Because middle class is used wrong in North America.
Poverty class is simple, you don’t have enough to live.
Labor class is divided into three;
Low labor, your barely paid enough to scrape by.
Middle labor, your paid enough for your work to live.
High labor, you’re paid well for your work. Perhaps you own your own small business.
Middle class, you aren’t paid a wage or salary anymore, you’re income comes from the things you own. As rich as a politician or nobility but not much political power.
Upper class, in old Europe this would be the nobels. Duke’s, Earls, Lords, that type of stuff. In modern north America this would be the ultra rich. You have political power and you own a lot of stuff. This is where most representatives are.
Politician class, former Royal class. You rule, extreme political power and wealth.
Most people in North America think they’re in the middle class when really they’re in the Labor middle class, it’s very different
Working class is everybody who must work to live.
Wealth class is everybody else.
There is no such thing as a middle class, that is a lie. Everybody seems to think they’re in the middle class, because that puts somebody below them, and gives them a reason to continue working under wage slavery. This is the purpose of the lie.
The fun thing is that everyone thinks they are middle class. When I was making €45k a year I thought I was middle class because I had an university degree and a leadership position. At the same time my boss, who had just spent €5mio acquiring a 50% share in a second company and owned three houses (two of which he rented out) also considered himself middle class because he wasn’t a billionaire.
because middle class is good and noble.
being poor or wealthy means you’re an asshole and is considered shameful.
hence everyone is desperate to claim they are not rich and desperately afraid of being seen as poor by people richer than themselves.
I once had a friend, which gf had to send him like 10Euro per month, for him to get monthly more than minimal wage which was considered “middle class” for some fucking reason in this country.
He was so emotional about this shit, that I am still not sure if he was for real about that or not…
for some fucking reason
I’m very curious what the reason is
I bet it’s for their bank. At least in Europe, many banks charge for your account if your income is below a threshold. My partner can’t work full time so I send them like 50€ per month so that they don’t have to pay bank fees. Which is ridiculous, as we have our 3 accounts all at the same bank.
Nah, he was too young and student too, so not bank income tax yet.
He just wanted to feel better than those “bottom class losers”. And I do not joke. He study economics.
He study economics
Checks out
A better metric is homeownership to me. Someone who is middle class is secure and doesn’t have to rent nor pay debt. They only really have to work when it’s mutually beneficial. That is basically impossible to achieve in the modern world with the hundreds or thousands of micro taxes and cartel controlled corporate markets and complete lack of land for the lease it’s to live on without virtual indentured servitude. Even if you did spend your entire life buying a house the state would just take it away from your children with the brutal taxation. Without a home you are always going to be a slave and have to work at any shitty job just to have food and a roof over your head.
Even if you own the house and land outright, you still need to pay real estate taxes, and feed yourself. Either you have the money in the bank to cover those expenses for the rest of your life or you don’t. You can have unexpected medical expenses, houses require maintenance which is generally expensive, and transportation is still an issue.
If you have to work to live, you are working class. Full stop.
I think of class like this, lower class, is people who start with nothing. Their parents can’t save any money for whatever reason. They have to start working as soon as they are out of school. They will probably never own anything.
Middle class is more like. The parents own a home, the child will probably own a home. They can go to college. They can move somewhere that better fits them.
Upper class to me is like “good” families, people who have homes and investments. Where the children don’t necessarily have to work. Where getting some type of education is almost expected.
The ultra wealthy to me are not upper class, they are just criminals.
The middle class does not exist.
Just about everybody draws a few lines around themselves, and describes everybody within them as middle class. It’s a meaningless distinction, because it means something different to everybody.
If you must work, you are working class.
Well sure there isn’t a physical thing like class. It’s just an abstraction that we as humans came up with but I like the idea of owning (not indebted) a home, which to me signifies middle class. This is mainly because it gives you a lot of sovereignty. You can choose not to work continually, if the market doesn’t pay a fair rate. You expenses are relatively low and controllable, since you don’t have taxable income and you can survive, even retire in this ideal society.
These days that’s very difficult with inflated asset prices, fiat currency, property taxation of the common people and things like that.
Yes my definition isn’t anymore or less true then anyone else’s because class isn’t something that exists, but personally this is how I see it. I only think in terms of working class when it comes to labor law versus business and stuff. It doesn’t have much use to me outside of thinking about workers rights. Most more left leaning people that I’m aware of these days don’t particularly care about workers and stuff much these days. They care more about things like welfare or equality which to me isn’t really a working class issue so much as a low class issue. I’m not anti welfare by any means. I just don’t think I have every heard like an American Democrats professional or not, advocate for giving workers time off, or protecting their wages from excessive taxation or forced profit sharing or anything like that.
America isn’t a right wing or left wing system. Democrats are mostly right wing and mostly liberals, they are also hard capitalists. The Republicans are mostly alt right and borderline to full blown Nazi. Workers come nowhere in the equation of political parties or the average worker. Most democratic and Republican voters seem to be mostly interested in building a massive surveillance state, rent capitalism via high taxation on the poor and low taxation on the rich, controlling each other, controlling speech and ideas. This is what most Americans for the past few decades regardless of party has found important enough to vote in. If you want someone to care about the working class you will probably have to somehow get your average American to stop being obsessed with spying on everyone in their society first because that is way higher on your average voters priority list.
no.
plenty of people rent their entire lives are fine. and plenty of people own homes get them foreclosed because they can’t afford the payments, or buy too much house.
owning a home isn’t really a huge economic benefit or security, unless your house massively goes up in value. a house is also a huge liability if it has problems. home owning nearly bankrupted my family at one point because of the crazy expensive repairs.
People can inherit a house and still be poor. Look at india
If you’re going to talk about class society, you might as well use the Marxist terms: proletariat, petit-bourgeoisie, and bourgeoise.
Even well paid doctors are labor class mostly. Because even in the past doctors weren’t as well paid as today.
most doctors come from wealthy families. and if you are anything above a PCP, you’re making like 300K+ a year, you’re not labor class. you’re part of the 1%. yeah being a resident and an intern sucks balls, but you’re taking a short term low age for a long term massive payoff.
80% of med students come from families making over 200K a year. that’s a hard fact.
most of us who grew up in middle/lower class families never even dreamed of being a doctor because we knew it was basically impossible for us without rich parents to help pay the bills for med school.
This is something I want to address. Firstly, youre correct. The vast majority of medical students come from VERY privileged backgrounds and it shows. Hell, applications fees can run from 75 to 300+ bucks a pop and the MCAT itself is almost 400 dollars.
That being said, if youre smart enough to get into med school, you should do it. I grew up about as poor as you could, I graduated early and immediately went into working fulltime. After the dotcom burst I became an EMT then a paramedic and started working 72+ hour weeks to save up for my premed. I was MUCH older than your standard 23 year old med school applicant.
But even if you have a relatively decent job (65k in a low cost of living area), the finances work out to pull the trigger and get your MD. Without doing any self doxxing, I can say a relatively uncompetitive specialty paid more in one year than I made in 5 years as a medic. I took 2 years for premed, a gap year, 4 in med school and 3 for residency. 10 years total. Which I made back in 2 years and thats not including the pay as a resident which was actually a bit higher than medic pay.
Your circumstances might prevent you from being a traditional applicant, and AAMCAS needs to work on the financial gatekeeping. You can absolutely swing going to medical school if you have the desire, will, and capability to though. It will be hard as hell though.
Were you really born in 1944?
Screwing the poor is a time honored tradition in capitalism.
From Cracked’s article, 5 Cruel Ways Being Poor Is Expensive
- Household Goods Like Toilet Paper Cost More For Poor People
- The IRS Audits Poor People More Frequently Than Rich People
- Poor People Have To Pay Extra To Access Money They’ve Already Earned
- “New Customer Fees” Are Thinly Disguised Penalties For Being Poor
- Nutritional Inequality Goes Much Deeper Than Food Deserts
From another article, 5 Screwed-Up Ways The World’s Stacked Against Poor People
- “Period Poverty” Is A Very Real Problem
- “Transit Deserts” Keep People From Finding Work
- Low-Income Housing Is Leaving Residents With Massive Energy Bills
- Low-Income Neighborhoods Experience Longer Emergency Response Times
- Low-Income Families Are More Likely To Be Audited
Finally, Why We Can’t Stop Hating The Poor
- We Have Laws Designed To Make The Poor Look Like Assholes
- The Hate Comes From Some Unexpected Places
- Poor People Smell Bad
- The Poor Remind Us That Sometimes The System Is In Fact Bullshit
- We Have To Believe People Deserve What They Get
Yeah, I think people who say that don’t realize a few key things.
First, they don’t understand the ‘poverty tax’ - how not having money for things like a security deposit, reliable transportation, or bulk buying actually costs you more in the long run.
And second, they don’t see how thin the margin for error is for most middle-class families. One medical bill or job loss is all it takes to fall behind.
Earn 3 times the amount of a proposed rent? You’re golden.
Earn below 3 times the amount of a proposed rent (but still enough to pay it each month)? Now you have to pay a guarantor to back you up. Last estimate I got was $800 for that service. You’ve gotta pay that before a landlord will accept you.
So if you earn less, you’re forced to pay more. It’s so fucking backwards.
Source: currently homeless, on numerous “waitlists” for low-income apartments that can take years to get through, housing lotteries that have 10s of thousands of people also hoping for a home, and attempting to scrounge the bottom of the barrel with tiny studio apartments (which, even if I apply to immediately, I’m behind others who somehow got to them faster.)
The system is absolutely fucked. I’m just grateful I enjoy my job (which, yes, I work full time, and earn above minimum wage for. Modern US society has no mercy for any of us.)
That used to be true, pre-1980’s, when the middle class was way, way bigger than it is today.
Username tracks.
Let the Leftist infighting commence!
pretty much. this entire thread is just folks arguing over the meanings of middle class, and most of them denying it exists as if that is going to create class solidarity. it won’t. majority of posters probably are middle class folks who would never in a million years associate with truly working class people. esp because the working class is typically conservative and doesn’t have liberal/progressive values, at least in the USA.
In Belgium lower income people also tend to vote more extreme. It’s even shown that whenever extreme right parties grow, it’s usually because they convinced people that previously voted extreme left.
People who vote for the socialist party are typically retired or work for the government in some capacity.
The middle class exists, and it sides with capital in its class interests.
Middle class, at least the income bracket that was middle class has been butchered.
Depending on how you were raised you might think that this class is living in luxury until you realize that your parents relied on tull time double income to make that middle class happen. Marketing for this class is horrible for fighting class divide. It gives the impression that wealth is achievable for everyone which is just a lie.
deleted by creator
If you don’t work with your hands but still need to work, you’re middle class, no?
plenty of manual laborers make bank dude. a lot of office workers barely make a living wage.
it’s more about your wealth, education, and lifestyle, not your the type of work you do.
deleted by creator
If you don’t have the poverty scar on one, or both, of your arms, I don’t want to hear shit about what you have to say on the topic of poverty.
If you don’t know what the poverty scar is, and you live in the US, then I will just assume you’ve never actually struggled, nor been around those who do.
I presume you are referencing people who donate plasma as frequently as possible to earn extra money to survive?
apparently you’re not in poverty if you donate plasma? that’s a new talking point.
pretty sure tons of people in poverty aren’t donating plasma and plenty of people who aren’t in poverty are doing it.
Opposite of that. People who have been in poverty for a long time know that plasma donation is one of the ways to keep the lights on or be able to afford food that week. After repeated donations, you are left with a buildup of scar tissue.
Those who haven’t suffered in poverty may donate occasionally for a few extra bucks, or just for the sake of doing it. But only those who are doing it constantly, twice a week, every week (that’s the maximum) for a long period of time will develop a scar.
Bingo
Are you gatekeeping poverty?
I’m pointing out a major, physical, sign that someone is, or has, struggled with poverty and knows first hand how hard that is.
I see way too many “hot takes” on how poverty works from people who don’t have the scar, or even know what it is. To me, that’s a big red flag that they don’t know wtf they’re talking about as they haven’t experienced it.
Generalizing things never work well.
I dont have a poverty scar but I know what it looks like… also I have been to the US. In many circumstances it is actually hard for me to believe that is the richest country on earth.
Oh damn. Well you can’t give plasma until youre 16, but I guess being homeless, having sleep for dinner and all of that growing up isn’t poverty because I couldn’t pass for a 16 year old as a child?
