Sitting around with the CoronaVirus19 allows one to much time to think I guess. You hear a lot about the poor in our country, the rich are not paying their fair share , and the middle class is just barely making it. I have a very close friend who is black, I'm white and we both live in different neighborhoods and different house styles. We have similarities and differences but get along. He thinks he's poor and I think he is middle class. He thinks I'm rich and I think I'm middle class.
I'm going with A. I know people who appear very rich but are in debt up to their eyeballs and I know people who live very meager frugal lives and have millions.
I didn't vote because I would have picked more than one. In general, though, I believe middle class is being able to provide for oneself (and family) without necessarily depending on social service programs (it can happen; but, is not an ongoing or long-term dependence). I believe materialism has created a cash-poor society as people chase to keep up with the Joneses. Basically, the middle class is the backbone of free society.
I'm going with E. Middle class is roughly 45k to 145k per year. Maybe your friend is in more in debt than you know.
That has changed over the years. The Reagan nuts split the middle class, the result is that what we used to call the lower middle class is simply not part of the middle any more. I've seen some interesting discussions among economists about that over the years.
I think middle class is about culture and values. Not money or education. Where you live is involved but not how much money you’ve inherited.
Wealth Accumulated. Someone who inherited millions but blew it all on coke n hookers will live under the same overpass as someone who inherited nothing and spent their life not doing anything about it.
The problem is (as is so often the case) is that the term has evolved over the years and has been used (and abused) by all sorts of different people for all sorts of different purposes, spinning it to mean whatever they need it to mean in their specific circumstances. Class wasn't originally about wealth or income directly. The concept came to be with the development of the middle class of working landowners, distinct from the "upper" class nobility and "lower" or "working" class of (pretty much) everyone else. As the legal and social distinctions between the classes reduced and softened, the main practical difference ended up being (typical) wealth and income and so the term class became a short-hand term for those distinctions. They're not quite as simple or distinct though, with the difference between wealth and income being just one obvious complication. Today I think people still use the term to mean whatever they want it to mean or use it lazily without considering the range of meanings and interpretations others will apply. In most circumstances, I don't think it's very useful or meaningful in practical terms and in general I think that if you want to talk about this kind of grouping or distinction, you have a responsibility to explain in more detail how you're drawing the lines rather than falling back on over-simplified singular terms or phrases. In my experience, that usually has negative intentions, negative consequences or both.
It depends on why the question is being asked. If it's for the purpose of determining an average then it's based on current income. From the current average it is further defined using upper/lower middle class. Where you live can influence how much you make (locality ranges).
I like your answer. It was meant to bring about discussion and that is why it was put in simple terms. The European way about classes is different than the American way which is different from the Middle East and Africa. India still has a caste system and of course socialist regimes and dictatorial have there own classification. Yet here in the USA we have a melting pot of people from many different countries and different forms of government. Culture and custom define many attitudes about class. Yet , our Constitution say's "all men are created equal" but by who's standards? When first written it didn't apply to woman, it didn't apply to all men, and sadly it classified some men as not whole men. Even though many of those discrepancies have been redressed, here we are 244 years later, pigeon holing each other by class. We still have groups who consider themselves the elites, some middle class and some poor or lower class.
The figures for "class" are calibrated around actual accumulated wealth, so, I voted for the first option. You can have a very large recurring income, but, if you have an even larger series of obligations or "debt-load", your true standing is much lower in the "class". I've known people who made five times more money in monthly income than I did, but they were so "stretched" with various obligations that they were actually living "paycheck-to-paycheck", just like the lower economic classes. Truth? Most Americans have no sense of financial DISCIPLINE. Which is a large part of why they couldn't even pay the current month's rent when the "virus" hit and they got laid off. People with no savings and no tangible, liquid assets always run the real risk of ending up in 'the ditch'... but they always want Uncle Sugar to come bail them out in spite of their irresponsibility!
The top 1% pay 40% of income taxes. The top 20% pay over 80% of income taxes. The bottom 50% pays virtually no income taxes. If the "rich" aren't paying their "fair share" then what would be their "fair share" and what is the "fair share" of the bottom 50%?
The wealthiest among us pay little in taxation because they have tax attorneys who take full advantage of the numerous loopholes, shelters, exemptions, exceptions, and other write-offs that the U.S. Tax Code is literally STUFFED with -- for the rich....
No, that's the strangest part -- the "super rich" are in the highest tax bracket -- BUT -- they don't pay more money in taxes in a true percentage of what they've earned! A lot of them pay little or NOTHING in taxes! From my Post #14 above: "The wealthiest among us pay little in taxation because they have tax attorneys who take full advantage of the numerous loopholes, shelters, exemptions, exceptions, and other write-offs that the U.S. Tax Code is literally STUFFED with -- for the rich....". Do you see how that works...? The über-rich complain endlessly about what a high tax bracket they're in, but that's all crap! By the time their tax attorneys and tax accountants milk all the loopholes in the U. S. Tax Code, they end up paying the least of everyone AS A PERCENTAGE OF THEIR ACTUAL INCOME! What "tax bracket" you're in means nothing if you have ways to write-off most or all of it anyway! And who is responsible for this ongoing injustice? Republicans AND Democrats have known about the completely unfair provisions in the Tax Code, and yet NONE of them have ever really cleaned this rotten mess up from top to bottom. And they never will, because they and their 'donors' laugh all the way to the bank!
I said "you hear the rich are not paying their fair share." It's really not part of my argument. I'm just interested in what people consider middle class and why. I myself am retired now and never in my life was rated in the upper percentile of wages. These last 20 years I have made below the national average but have had 15 years of those supplemented by Social Security and two small pensions. Yet, I have lived in an above average neighborhood with over a acre of land , a car 2012 and a truck 2006. I have little debt. I take vacations 2 or 3 times a year . Money has never been an issue with me. I live in my means. Always have. If I want something extra I get a part time job. If I was rich I wouldn't know how to act anyways. I have lived on the street, in trailer parks and minority neighborhoods and survived. My daddy took me past one of those streets with mansions and told me when I was young "you don't know what goes on behind closed doors". " Be a good caretaker of what God gives you and he may give you a little more to manage"
You can have all the money in the world or no money and be in between the two but if you don't treat me and my family with respect then "you have no class". When I was young and the family was outside among people it was expected to show respect for your elders. Children were seen and not heard. Yes and No Sir . Thank You. Please. May I help you? I was a white kid in a all black neighborhood, I had my share of fights with other kids, but the grown up's received our utmost respect.
Well you brought it up and injected it so what would that be to be fair? So being in that lower income group that pays little if any income tax what is your beef with rich people and why they should pay even more taxes instead of you? BTW I am retire and on social security and have no debt with a house and two cars and a nice nest egg I save for all of my life. And I could care less how much some rich person has.
We don't tax wealth we tax income and they already pay 40% of the income taxes to fund the government how much more of it should just 1% pay?
agree, the other issue is things do not last as long as they used to, used to be washing machines, window air conditions, ect... lasted forever also rent and utilities is higher as a percent of most peoples income then it was in the past
Very tough question. You can make the argument that everyone of those categorizes you listed could be used to express so called "middle class". You can look purely at statistics but there would be some many additional factors that would qualify the stats. For example medium household income in the US is about $65K. You could use that number and build a 1 or 2 standard deviation range to determine middle class but then what about regional differences. $65K may be upper middle class in rural America but in Silicon Valley you would be poor. Same thing is true with wealth. People gain more wealth as they age so you could look at the medium retirement wealth around $250000 but even that number is deceiving. The medium price of a home in San Mateo is over $1.4 million so if you want to remain there when retire you better have much more than $250K when you retire.
