What makes someone Upper rather than Middle class?

[luckyjimm]

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Okay so 50 Cent is really seen as upper class, and not just a working class / underclass guy with money?

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We have a separate class for them.

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Celebrities = outside the class structure, right?

[BaggyAnt]

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If you think that your money makes you better than everyone else then you're upper class. If you don't you're middle class (or potentially lower class if you like NASCAR).

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Actually I think in the UK this is the opposite way around, the more you measure a person by their wealth the more likely you are to be middle class.

Class is such a tricky subject in the UK as a whole anyhow, for example I will always feel I am Working Class even though the job I have would potentially indicate to others that I am Middle Class.

[britspin]

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You're right that a family's class can change quickly between generations; and also different siblings can have radically different circumstances. This is common amongst the aristocracy, though, where primogeniture can still be enforced. My friend's aunt, a Lady, lives in a little flat in Battersea, while her brother who inherited the estate owns a huge country house, lots of land, and in fact an entire seaside village in Devon! It was always the duty of upper class women to marry well, though, so the wealth of their husband would make up for them not inheriting.

Even with globalisation, all of this stuff still exists.

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yeah- the fate of second (and third, and fourth) sons was pretty limited. Education for a good background, a little capital then go off to the church/army/make your own fortune.

If things were still the same I guess second sons would crop up a lot in music, TV and films (a la Prince Edward).

[XXXNoahXXX]

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in USA, i think there are so few "aristocratic" families historically that here the difference isnt so much you family lineage but how much you earn and how much you spend.

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Yeah, obviously it helps if your name is Rockefeller, but this is true.

My mother grew up lower/middle class and my father grew up lower class. I grew up middle class.

How I define these:

Mother- Never had any money, never took vacations except MA->RI, but lived in a little house in small town.

Father- Lived in housing projects and lived on gov't food stamps, etc.

Me- We took some vacations, I owned video game systems, dressed in decent clothes, played youth soccer, but if my father lost his job we'd be screwed in a hurry.


I am now in a position where I determine the fate of my class. I am in law school, so the range of money I could be making in 2 years is from $30,000 to $160,000. Unless I somehow become a drug addict/things go really bad, I think I've avoided lower class. However, if I become a DA and make $40k per year, I will be a middle class guy. Crunching the numbers each month for rent and loan payments, trying to stick some away for a vacation, driving a Corolla. Or I could go to a big law firm, and make partner in ten years, taking in upper six figures, going to $5000 plate charity dinners, taking trips to play golf, and learning about wine and opera.

So from my father being as poor as there is in this country to me being fully ingratiated into the uppercrust is not an impossibility. Not that I want that, but the social and economic mobility in the US just seems to that much more free than elsewhere.

[luckyjimm]

Has there been a "what class are you?" thread already?

[The DaveR]

I think in the US the dividing line is probably around 250K/yr, give or take. Class typically means income almost exclusively, I think, here.

[XXXNoahXXX]

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I think in the US the dividing line is probably around 250K/yr, give or take. Class typically means income almost exclusively, I think, here.

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Yeah you have to say "almost" because you need to account for celebrities, reality show winners, lottery winners, and the other rejects that are certainly "rich" but not "upper class"

[ChipStorm]

One of the best books ever on class in America:

Class: A Guide Through the American Status System

Edit: Class in America is only tied to money in the vaguest way. Class is about how you treat others, how you see yourself, and how you tolerate the way others treat you.

[prohornblower]

I think it's much less about your income than it is your decisions and mores.

Certainly income can play a large role in it, but it isn't the sole factor.

There are people who earn large salaries, but will always be middle class because of how they choose to spend their money, and the like.

Also, people confuse income with net worth, which is silly.

[luckyjimm]

In the late 1950s John Aspinall ran a gambling club in Mayfair, London for the English upper classes. One night the police raided it and charged Aspinall and his fellow players with "keeping a common gambling house". "Young man," Aspinall's mother told the officer in charge, "there was nothing common in this house until you entered it."

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