What is considered "Middle Class" in this country?

[Elixir]

The U.S. doesn't have a middle-class, individual states, cities, communities have a middle class. The most cogent definition is likely something along the lines of the middle third of the income spectrum in the community you live in.

I assume you mean the middle third of the people on that spectrum, not the middle third of the income spectrum itself - which, in many US communities is barely occupied. Such is the state of wealth disparity in the US.

The income spectrum would be a scatter-plot of incomes in a community, so the middle third of people, and the middle third of the spectrum is the same thing. I can see how one would want to politicize the definition, but the only real way to define middle class is this way. Plot incomes, and take the middle third. If many people lean to the left that means there is a large lower class and a small middle class.

I see it differently.

If you have 100 people making between 10,000 and 1,000,000 dollars a year, the middle of the spectrum is 500k. But if only 5 people are making $1,000,000, 25 people are making 100,000 and 70 of them are making 10,000, the middle third of the people are making 10,000. A long way from the middle of the “income spectrum”.

And that’s basically what’s going on with the US economy.
In fact, the top of the US income spectrum was $140,000,000,000.00 last year (Elon Musk). Presumably the bottom was zero. The middle third of the spectrum ($46.66... billion to about $93 billion) probably contains literally nobody except Bezos.

 

[Swammerdami]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

(Contrary to the TFTer known as Explosive#20, comparison is best made within a country. Thailand has a surging Middle Class living a middle class life-style whose income would be U.S.A. lower-class if rendered in dollars.)

Thomas Piketty defines Upper Class as having 90-percentile income or higher, Middle Class as 50- to 90-percentile, and Lower Class as less than 50-percentile, but he stresses that these are arbitrary thresholds just to simplify some of his graphs and statistics; and that better boundaries vary between societies.

The status of the Middle Class is closely tied to Income Equality. Piketty's Figure 1.1 titled "Income Inequality in the United States, 1910-2010" shows the share of income earned by the top 10%. This was about 40% in the 1910's (though soaring briefly to 45% in 1916), then soared from 40% to 50% during the 1920's, stayed near 45% during the 1930's, dropped to 32% at the height of WWII, and was still below 35% in 1981. Since 1981 this measure has rose (except for slumps during financial crises), and in 2007 reached 50%, topping the previous high in 1928.

Piketty has many other interesting graphs, including Figure 9.5, similar to the Fig. 1.1 just described but for the top 0.1% of earners instead of the top 10%. (The income share of the top 0.1% in the U.S.A. peaked at 10% in 1916, fell to 5.5% but back to 8% in 1928, was 2% during 1960's and 1970's, and rose to 8% by 2007.) untermensche/Chomsky have an interesting take on the resurgence of inequality beginning in the 1980's and 1990's; it may not be completely wrong.

Many of us think of "Upper Class" as referring to owners who don't need to worry about money. I was startled recently when the Google News home page showed a link to "My wife and I have only saved $15 Million — Is that enough to retire?" I think that the vast income and wealth gulf between American haves and have-nots is one reason dialog has become so difficulty.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

On the terminology dispute: arithmetic mean, geometric mean, harmonic mean, median, mode are all measures of central tendency. "Mean" by itself refers to arithmetic mean. The unadorned word "average" is equivalent to "arithmetic mean" according to most lexicographers but, unfortunately, is increasingly used to denote "median" in some contexts.

The three types of "mean" are not recent concepts but were discussed by ancient Greek mathematicians

There are three means in music: one is arithmetic, second is the geometric, third is sub-contrary, which they call harmonic. The mean is arithmetic when three terms are in proportion such that the excess by which the first exceeds the second is that by which the second exceeds the third. In this proportion it turns out that the interval of the greater terms is less, but that of the lesser terms greater. The mean is the geometric when they are such that as the first is to the second, so the second is to the third. Of these terms the greater and the lesser have the interval between them equal. Subcontrary, which we call harmonic, is the mean when they are such that, by whatever part of itself the first term exceeds the second, by that part of the third the middle term exceeds the third. It turns out that in this proportion the interval between the greater terms is greater and that between the lesser terms is less.

Some also speak of the "quadratic mean" which is the "root mean square" often used in signal processing.

 

[bilby]

Social class (even in the US) has little to do with money.

The upper class are a small aristocracy whose major characteristic is the ability to leverage their contacts within that class to achieve their goals (uppermost of which are retaining their membership of that class, and denying entry to it to anyone else), and for whom income is largely irrelevant due to their access (direct or via netwoking) to large pools of wealth.

The middle and lower classes work for a living; The most significant difference is that working class people get dirty, and middle class people don't. The descriptions 'blue collar' and 'white collar' apply here, with a 'white collar' as an indication that ones work clothes are not designed to facilitate dirty or highly manual labour. Most 'blue collar' workers today actually wear high-vis, so perhaps 'fluoro collar' would be more appropriate today.

The NRS social grade system recognises this structure, and divides households into seven categories based on the employment of the head of the household. The ~4% of people in the upper classes are then discarded, to give three 'middle class' classifications (A, B, and C1), and three 'working class' classifications (C2, D and E). The Es are technically not 'working class', as they constitute people from households with no employment income.

There's a significant overlap in income and wealth between the C1 and C2 categories, and the top earners in C2 frequently earn more than even the bottom earners in B, reflecting the fact that class and income (or wealth) are only tenuously linked concepts.

About three quarters of UK households are in categories B, C1, or C2.

Most commonly this classification (which was designed as a market research tool to target likely consumers) is used to divide people into ABC1 'middle class' and C2DE 'working class', with advertising being targeted at these two groups in rather different ways.

Famously there was a new unemployment benefit heavily advertised by the Conservative government in the 1980s, where analysis of the ad placement indicated that the target was the ABC1 demographic; The idea was that this would give middle class voters an image of a caring and socially responsible government, while avoiding the unpleasantness of having to actually pay the benefit to large numbers of people.

 

[ZiprHead]

[YOUTUBE]https://youtu.be/sRdsmU-Uf3I[/YOUTUBE]

 

[J842P]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

There is a newish term which I believe is very useful, the notion of the "professional managerial class."

 

[rousseau]

The income spectrum would be a scatter-plot of incomes in a community, so the middle third of people, and the middle third of the spectrum is the same thing. I can see how one would want to politicize the definition, but the only real way to define middle class is this way. Plot incomes, and take the middle third. If many people lean to the left that means there is a large lower class and a small middle class.

I see it differently.

If you have 100 people making between 10,000 and 1,000,000 dollars a year, the middle of the spectrum is 500k. But if only 5 people are making $1,000,000, 25 people are making 100,000 and 70 of them are making 10,000, the middle third of the people are making 10,000. A long way from the middle of the “income spectrum”.

And that’s basically what’s going on with the US economy.
In fact, the top of the US income spectrum was $140,000,000,000.00 last year (Elon Musk). Presumably the bottom was zero. The middle third of the spectrum ($46.66... billion to about $93 billion) probably contains literally nobody except Bezos.

I believe we're still saying the same thing and that you're misinterpreting my post. To measure the robustness of middle incomes, you look at the middle third of incomes. If those are predominantly very low then you have a weak middle class.

What you would be doing is analyzing the shape of the middle third (not the middle third of the scatter-plot, the middle-third of incomes) to understand the economy that it describes. The equal society is a nice, consistent bell curve.

 

[rousseau]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

It's worth mentioning that a community with a robust middle class is the ideal, that means it's equalized. This was the main driving force away from monarchy into constitutional democracy, people wanted a more meritocratic and fair playing field to conduct business in. The endemic problem in history, however, is that power begets more power, and so one faction of our world is trying to equalize things, while the other is making things less equal by the very existence of their own wealth.

But in my view distinctions like middle-class and upper-class aren't super useful - these aren't hard lines that people don't move across, and you can't really characterize an entire group based on how much money they have. At most, measuring the quality of a community's middle class tells us how fair the playing field is and how healthy an economy is. And this is a metric that will always be an ideal, and shifting across time (power begets power).

 

[bilby]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

It's worth mentioning that a community with a robust middle class is the ideal, that means it's equalized. This was the main driving force away from monarchy into constitutional democracy, people wanted a more meritocratic and fair playing field to conduct business in. The endemic problem in history, however, is that power begets more power, and so one faction of our world is trying to equalize things, while the other is making things less equal by the very existence of their own wealth.

But in my view distinctions like middle-class and upper-class aren't super useful - these aren't hard lines that people don't move across, and you can't really characterize an entire group based on how much money they have. At most, measuring the quality of a community's middle class tells us how fair the playing field is and how healthy an economy is. And this is a metric that will always be an ideal, and shifting across time (power begets power).

As I said, traditionally class is only tangentially related to wealth, and the distinction between a wealthy middle class person (a member of the 'nouveau riche') and a poor upper class aristocrat is that the upper classes share a network of contacts within their class, and exclude others from entry to their club. Movement from working class to middle class is less difficult these days (though that's a relatively new thing in Europe, copied from the New World); But even there there's a distinct barrier - not of wealth, but of status, culture, interests, behaviour, manners, and attitude.

Money barely enters into it. A working class person who wins the lottery is still working class. A middle class person whose business makes him a billionaire is still middle class. And an upper class person who loses their wealth remains a member of the upper class.

These ARE hard lines that people rarely move across; and they are not economic lines, as much as they are social and cultural lines.

Indeed, the idea that class is about wealth is an incredibly middle class position. Both the working and upper classes set far more importance on family and acquaintance, using their social networks to improve their lot. For both classes, money is largely irrelevant - the working class doesn't have any to spare for non-essentials, and the upper classes consider money to be gauche, and a taboo topic in polite company. The upper classes are supposed to be effortlessly wealthy, and to care little who has (or doesn't have), money. The upper classes have power, with wealth as a mere consequence of that fact.

Perhaps the reason that people have such difficulties in defining an economic 'middle class' is that the only people they are considering when attempting the definition are the middle class - who are the only class that make money a defining element of status.

 

[rousseau]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

It's worth mentioning that a community with a robust middle class is the ideal, that means it's equalized. This was the main driving force away from monarchy into constitutional democracy, people wanted a more meritocratic and fair playing field to conduct business in. The endemic problem in history, however, is that power begets more power, and so one faction of our world is trying to equalize things, while the other is making things less equal by the very existence of their own wealth.

But in my view distinctions like middle-class and upper-class aren't super useful - these aren't hard lines that people don't move across, and you can't really characterize an entire group based on how much money they have. At most, measuring the quality of a community's middle class tells us how fair the playing field is and how healthy an economy is. And this is a metric that will always be an ideal, and shifting across time (power begets power).

As I said, traditionally class is only tangentially related to wealth, and the distinction between a wealthy middle class person (a member of the 'nouveau riche') and a poor upper class aristocrat is that the upper classes share a network of contacts within their class, and exclude others from entry to their club. Movement from working class to middle class is less difficult these days (though that's a relatively new thing in Europe, copied from the New World); But even there there's a distinct barrier - not of wealth, but of status, culture, interests, behaviour, manners, and attitude.

Money barely enters into it. A working class person who wins the lottery is still working class. A middle class person whose business makes him a billionaire is still middle class. And an upper class person who loses their wealth remains a member of the upper class.

These ARE hard lines that people rarely move across; and they are not economic lines, as much as they are social and cultural lines.

Indeed, the idea that class is about wealth is an incredibly middle class position. Both the working and upper classes set far more importance on family and acquaintance, using their social networks to improve their lot. For both classes, money is largely irrelevant - the working class doesn't have any to spare for non-essentials, and the upper classes consider money to be gauche, and a taboo topic in polite company. The upper classes are supposed to be effortlessly wealthy, and to care little who has (or doesn't have), money. The upper classes have power, with wealth as a mere consequence of that fact.

Perhaps the reason that people have such difficulties in defining an economic 'middle class' is that the only people they are considering when attempting the definition are the middle class - who are the only class that make money a defining element of status.

Here we have a thread where we're trying to give an economic definition to the middle class. If the 'upper' class is wealthy by default, how is their wealth not a major component of what it means to be in their class?

I don't think anybody is confusing wealth with status, but I don't think you can really extricate the wealth of the upper class from their social power. The reason they have social power is because, at some point, their family became wealthy.

The corollary there is that people can move into the upper class. But obviously extreme wealth and power is rare by definition.

Sent from my SM-A520W using Tapatalk

 

[bilby]

As I said, traditionally class is only tangentially related to wealth, and the distinction between a wealthy middle class person (a member of the 'nouveau riche') and a poor upper class aristocrat is that the upper classes share a network of contacts within their class, and exclude others from entry to their club. Movement from working class to middle class is less difficult these days (though that's a relatively new thing in Europe, copied from the New World); But even there there's a distinct barrier - not of wealth, but of status, culture, interests, behaviour, manners, and attitude.

Money barely enters into it. A working class person who wins the lottery is still working class. A middle class person whose business makes him a billionaire is still middle class. And an upper class person who loses their wealth remains a member of the upper class.

These ARE hard lines that people rarely move across; and they are not economic lines, as much as they are social and cultural lines.

Indeed, the idea that class is about wealth is an incredibly middle class position. Both the working and upper classes set far more importance on family and acquaintance, using their social networks to improve their lot. For both classes, money is largely irrelevant - the working class doesn't have any to spare for non-essentials, and the upper classes consider money to be gauche, and a taboo topic in polite company. The upper classes are supposed to be effortlessly wealthy, and to care little who has (or doesn't have), money. The upper classes have power, with wealth as a mere consequence of that fact.

Perhaps the reason that people have such difficulties in defining an economic 'middle class' is that the only people they are considering when attempting the definition are the middle class - who are the only class that make money a defining element of status.

Here we have a thread where we're trying to give an economic definition to the middle class. If the 'upper' class is wealthy by default, how is their wealth not a major component of what it means to be in their class?

I don't think anybody is confusing wealth with status, but I don't think you can really extricate the wealth of the upper class from their social power. The reason they have social power is because, at some point, their family became wealthy.

The corollary there is that people can move into the upper class. But obviously extreme wealth and power is rare by definition.

Sent from my SM-A520W using Tapatalk

You have it exactly backwards. The upper class is wealthy because it is powerful, not the other way around. And their power derives from their networks, which means that even if they should become poor, they are likely to be able to recover the lost wealth via those networks.

The upper classes in Europe are upper class because they have (or had) the ear of the king or emperor, who then granted them the power that they could leverage into wealth. Their ancestors were friends of royalty, and where royalty still exists, they remain friends of royalty.

Where royalty has been displaced without a bloodbath of the nobles, the upper classes have ensured that they remain connected with the new holders of power. This is perhaps most obvious in institutions like the British House of Lords; But a quick glance at the list of surnames of members of the Commons shows frighteningly significant similarities with the same list from the Seventeenth Century - which is very odd if election to the Commons is purely a matter of merit, rather than one of birth and/or connections.

The aristocrats learned to keep a low profile in the various revolutions of the C17th and 18th; But they are still with us, even if they don't show themselves. The US Presidency is supposedly open to all Americans, yet even in the last century it has been frequently held by members of the upper classes that Americans think they don't have (including the current holder of the office, and notably excluding his predecessor, but including his predecessor's opponent who won the popular vote and was widely expected to win easily). Americans think money is important, but to the upper class it's important as a consequence of power, more often than as a means to gaining power.

When people say that Trump has no class, it's not just a figure of speech.

The upper class don't need money to become upper class; They are mostly born upper class, and as a result have money bestowed upon them whether they like it or not. And no amount of wealth will get a middle class person into the upper class. Only by doing favours for those at the top can that status be conferred upon someone not born to it, and if that favour is merely financial support for political campaigns, it likely needs to be sustained for several generations to achieve that transition.

 

[Jason Harvestdancer]

The middle class is defined as those whose income lies between half the median income and double the median income.

 

[bilby]

The middle class is defined as those whose income lies between half the median income and double the median income.

By whom? And for what purpose? And to what valuable end?

What, in short, can we do with this definition to help us to understand society, history, economics, or anything else?

Why is this definition, that you state as though it were natural law, unquestioned and unquestionable, THE definition, rather than merely a rather unhelpful definition?

 

[bilby]

[YOUTUBE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C4HflC2L7M4[/YOUTUBE]

Three middle class British comedians discussing class in the 1960s

Note the discussion of money at 0:37

 

[rousseau]

As I said, traditionally class is only tangentially related to wealth, and the distinction between a wealthy middle class person (a member of the 'nouveau riche') and a poor upper class aristocrat is that the upper classes share a network of contacts within their class, and exclude others from entry to their club. Movement from working class to middle class is less difficult these days (though that's a relatively new thing in Europe, copied from the New World); But even there there's a distinct barrier - not of wealth, but of status, culture, interests, behaviour, manners, and attitude.

Money barely enters into it. A working class person who wins the lottery is still working class. A middle class person whose business makes him a billionaire is still middle class. And an upper class person who loses their wealth remains a member of the upper class.

These ARE hard lines that people rarely move across; and they are not economic lines, as much as they are social and cultural lines.

Indeed, the idea that class is about wealth is an incredibly middle class position. Both the working and upper classes set far more importance on family and acquaintance, using their social networks to improve their lot. For both classes, money is largely irrelevant - the working class doesn't have any to spare for non-essentials, and the upper classes consider money to be gauche, and a taboo topic in polite company. The upper classes are supposed to be effortlessly wealthy, and to care little who has (or doesn't have), money. The upper classes have power, with wealth as a mere consequence of that fact.

Perhaps the reason that people have such difficulties in defining an economic 'middle class' is that the only people they are considering when attempting the definition are the middle class - who are the only class that make money a defining element of status.

Here we have a thread where we're trying to give an economic definition to the middle class. If the 'upper' class is wealthy by default, how is their wealth not a major component of what it means to be in their class?

I don't think anybody is confusing wealth with status, but I don't think you can really extricate the wealth of the upper class from their social power. The reason they have social power is because, at some point, their family became wealthy.

The corollary there is that people can move into the upper class. But obviously extreme wealth and power is rare by definition.

Sent from my SM-A520W using Tapatalk

You have it exactly backwards. The upper class is wealthy because it is powerful, not the other way around. And their power derives from their networks, which means that even if they should become poor, they are likely to be able to recover the lost wealth via those networks.

The upper classes in Europe are upper class because they have (or had) the ear of the king or emperor, who then granted them the power that they could leverage into wealth. Their ancestors were friends of royalty, and where royalty still exists, they remain friends of royalty.

Where royalty has been displaced without a bloodbath of the nobles, the upper classes have ensured that they remain connected with the new holders of power. This is perhaps most obvious in institutions like the British House of Lords; But a quick glance at the list of surnames of members of the Commons shows frighteningly significant similarities with the same list from the Seventeenth Century - which is very odd if election to the Commons is purely a matter of merit, rather than one of birth and/or connections.

The aristocrats learned to keep a low profile in the various revolutions of the C17th and 18th; But they are still with us, even if they don't show themselves. The US Presidency is supposedly open to all Americans, yet even in the last century it has been frequently held by members of the upper classes that Americans think they don't have (including the current holder of the office, and notably excluding his predecessor, but including his predecessor's opponent who won the popular vote and was widely expected to win easily). Americans think money is important, but to the upper class it's important as a consequence of power, more often than as a means to gaining power.

When people say that Trump has no class, it's not just a figure of speech.

The upper class don't need money to become upper class; They are mostly born upper class, and as a result have money bestowed upon them whether they like it or not. And no amount of wealth will get a middle class person into the upper class. Only by doing favours for those at the top can that status be conferred, and if that favour is merely financial support for political campaigns, it likely needs to be sustained for several generations to achieve that transition.

That sounds reasonable, but does seem to generalize a bit. The lived reality is likely quite a bit more convoluted than your post conveys.

How do the initial power holders gain social influence? By building wealth. What type of person is typically allowed into the network of a powerful person? Does some level of pre-existing wealth and status play a part or is it completely arbitrary? How often are those in abject poverty invited into a wealthy social circle?

It's quite reasonable that networking is a major component of the lives of the upper class. Why wouldn't it be? If someone has social influence why wouldn't they use it? But this thread is about defining a class economically, and by definition the upper class are wealthier than the middle. This makes wealth an intrinsic part of what it means to be in that class. If that wasn't the case then financial status should be completely arbitrary.

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[bilby]

You have it exactly backwards. The upper class is wealthy because it is powerful, not the other way around. And their power derives from their networks, which means that even if they should become poor, they are likely to be able to recover the lost wealth via those networks.

The upper classes in Europe are upper class because they have (or had) the ear of the king or emperor, who then granted them the power that they could leverage into wealth. Their ancestors were friends of royalty, and where royalty still exists, they remain friends of royalty.

Where royalty has been displaced without a bloodbath of the nobles, the upper classes have ensured that they remain connected with the new holders of power. This is perhaps most obvious in institutions like the British House of Lords; But a quick glance at the list of surnames of members of the Commons shows frighteningly significant similarities with the same list from the Seventeenth Century - which is very odd if election to the Commons is purely a matter of merit, rather than one of birth and/or connections.

The aristocrats learned to keep a low profile in the various revolutions of the C17th and 18th; But they are still with us, even if they don't show themselves. The US Presidency is supposedly open to all Americans, yet even in the last century it has been frequently held by members of the upper classes that Americans think they don't have (including the current holder of the office, and notably excluding his predecessor, but including his predecessor's opponent who won the popular vote and was widely expected to win easily). Americans think money is important, but to the upper class it's important as a consequence of power, more often than as a means to gaining power.

When people say that Trump has no class, it's not just a figure of speech.

The upper class don't need money to become upper class; They are mostly born upper class, and as a result have money bestowed upon them whether they like it or not. And no amount of wealth will get a middle class person into the upper class. Only by doing favours for those at the top can that status be conferred, and if that favour is merely financial support for political campaigns, it likely needs to be sustained for several generations to achieve that transition.

That sounds reasonable, but does seem to generalize a bit. The lived reality is likely quite a bit more convoluted than your post conveys.

How do the initial power holders gain social influence? By building wealth. What type of person is typically allowed into the network of a powerful person?

Those who are useful, or in a position to do them a favour.

Does some level of pre-existing wealth and status play a part or is it completely arbitrary?

It's completely arbitrary, though wealthy people may be more likely to have the opportunity. Realistically, the movement into the upper class is tiny and negligible; If you want your familiy to become upper class, the best way by far is to befriend William the Bastard in the eleventh century, or one of his heirs over the following five hundred years.

How often are those in abject poverty invited into a wealthy social circle?

Rarely, but that's through lack of interaction, not lack of wealth per se, and the unasked question 'How often are those with considerable wealth invited into an upper class social circle?' has the same answer. It's a closed shop; Few get in, regardless of wealth.

It's quite reasonable that networking is a major component of the lives of the upper class. Why wouldn't it be? If someone has social influence why wouldn't they use it? But this thread is about defining a class economically, and by definition the upper class are wealthier than the middle.

No, they are NOT. The upper class is defined by power, not wealth. Check out what John Cleese says at 0:37 in that video I posted.

This makes wealth an intrinsic part of what it means to be in that class. If that wasn't the case then financial status should be completely arbitrary.

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This thread is actually discussing divisions within the middle class, for all that it thinks it's discussing the difference between the middle class and upper and working classes.

Only the middle class focus on wealth. The upper classes focus on power and influence, and the working class focus on mutual survival networks, and have no wealth to focus upon.

The developed world is a middle class world. The upper class keep their heads down and interact with the middle class largely via government processes, rather than direct personal interaction. The working class has been exported to the Third World. This is a late 20th Century phenomenon - before WWII, and certainly before WWI, the three classes interacted in every community, and class structures were rigid to protect the divisions between them.

The reason that the middle class seems so hard to define is that everyone under consideration is middle class. You don't know or see the upper class, except as a kind of soap opera depiction of the British Royal family. And you don't know or see the working class, because they live in China and India

 

[ZiprHead]

The middle class is defined as those whose income lies between half the median income and double the median income.

By whom? And for what purpose? And to what valuable end?

What, in short, can we do with this definition to help us to understand society, history, economics, or anything else?

Why is this definition, that you state as though it were natural law, unquestioned and unquestionable, THE definition, rather than merely a rather unhelpful definition?

It does answer the OP question.

 

[bilby]

The middle class is defined as those whose income lies between half the median income and double the median income.

By whom? And for what purpose? And to what valuable end?

What, in short, can we do with this definition to help us to understand society, history, economics, or anything else?

Why is this definition, that you state as though it were natural law, unquestioned and unquestionable, THE definition, rather than merely a rather unhelpful definition?

It does answer the OP question.

It does, but in a completely unhelpful way.

That definition would be great as a preface to a thesis that discusses wealth, as an indicator of the specific meaning being used in that thesis. But on its own, it's just one of many possible definitions, with no indication of why or where it should be considered better than any other definition.

 

[Swammerdami]

In ancient times the gulf between land-owners and peasants, serfs and slaves was huge, with few in the middle. The notion of "middle class" began in places like England and Holland as merchants and some skilled craftsmen developed wealth and power. That distinction may seem old-fashioned now, but it remains an approximation to today's reality. The Upper Class are Owners who needn't work; the Middle Class include highly-skilled professionals and semi-skilled (often unionized) workers able to earn high wages; the Lower Class lead a hand-to-mouth life.

It's worth mentioning that a community with a robust middle class is the ideal, that means it's equalized. This was the main driving force away from monarchy into constitutional democracy, people wanted a more meritocratic and fair playing field to conduct business in. The endemic problem in history, however, is that power begets more power, and so one faction of our world is trying to equalize things, while the other is making things less equal by the very existence of their own wealth.

But in my view distinctions like middle-class and upper-class aren't super useful - these aren't hard lines that people don't move across, and you can't really characterize an entire group based on how much money they have. At most, measuring the quality of a community's middle class tells us how fair the playing field is and how healthy an economy is. And this is a metric that will always be an ideal, and shifting across time (power begets power).

As I said, traditionally class is only tangentially related to wealth, and the distinction between a wealthy middle class person (a member of the 'nouveau riche') and a poor upper class aristocrat is that the upper classes share a network of contacts within their class, and exclude others from entry to their club. Movement from working class to middle class is less difficult these days (though that's a relatively new thing in Europe, copied from the New World); But even there there's a distinct barrier - not of wealth, but of status, culture, interests, behaviour, manners, and attitude.

Money barely enters into it. A working class person who wins the lottery is still working class. A middle class person whose business makes him a billionaire is still middle class. And an upper class person who loses their wealth remains a member of the upper class.

These ARE hard lines that people rarely move across; and they are not economic lines, as much as they are social and cultural lines.
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I think this is very misleading, especially in the case of the U.S.A.

You're right that nouveau riche are often looked down on by "old money." But with sufficient wealth, the children and grandchildren of a multi-millionaire soon learn to imitate the manners of the "upper class." J.D. Rockefeller and J.J. Astor each came from a working-class background and became extremely wealthy. I don't know how well accepted these men were by the "upper class", but their children and grandchildren certainly were. (This is accomplished partly by marriage: both the named super-rich has sons-in-law who came from prominent families.)

 

[rousseau]

Those who are useful, or in a position to do them a favour.

Does some level of pre-existing wealth and status play a part or is it completely arbitrary?

It's completely arbitrary, though wealthy people may be more likely to have the opportunity. Realistically, the movement into the upper class is tiny and negligible; If you want your familiy to become upper class, the best way by far is to befriend William the Bastard in the eleventh century, or one of his heirs over the following five hundred years.

How often are those in abject poverty invited into a wealthy social circle?

Rarely, but that's through lack of interaction, not lack of wealth per se, and the unasked question 'How often are those with considerable wealth invited into an upper class social circle?' has the same answer. It's a closed shop; Few get in, regardless of wealth.

It's quite reasonable that networking is a major component of the lives of the upper class. Why wouldn't it be? If someone has social influence why wouldn't they use it? But this thread is about defining a class economically, and by definition the upper class are wealthier than the middle.

No, they are NOT. The upper class is defined by power, not wealth. Check out what John Cleese says at 0:37 in that video I posted.

This makes wealth an intrinsic part of what it means to be in that class. If that wasn't the case then financial status should be completely arbitrary.

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This thread is actually discussing divisions within the middle class, for all that it thinks it's discussing the difference between the middle class and upper and working classes.

Only the middle class focus on wealth. The upper classes focus on power and influence, and the working class focus on mutual survival networks, and have no wealth to focus upon.

The developed world is a middle class world. The upper class keep their heads down and interact with the middle class largely via government processes, rather than direct personal interaction. The working class has been exported to the Third World. This is a late 20th Century phenomenon - before WWII, and certainly before WWI, the three classes interacted in every community, and class structures were rigid to protect the divisions between them.

The reason that the middle class seems so hard to define is that everyone under consideration is middle class. You don't know or see the upper class, except as a kind of soap opera depiction of the British Royal family. And you don't know or see the working class, because they live in China and India

I don't have to be wrong for you to be right, and vice versa, there can be shades of grey in both of our posts. My larger point is that the lived reality of anything often doesn't fit cleanly into tidy narratives, and my last few posts point out some of the ways this might be true in this case. I'm glad you made the last few posts because it's got me thinking more deeply about the character of the upper class.

 

[RVonse]

You guys are making this wayyy too complicated.

If you are flying around in your personal private jet.....you are not middle class. No one in the middle class owns their own private jet.
Or if you are begging at the street with a sign around your neck for food....you are not middle class either. Middle class people don't go hungry.

Everyone else is middle class. And if you make more than you spend you are middle class and rich.

You don't need a lot of numbers, tables, and graphs to figure this out...