What is middle class?

[dolliebauble]

I feel very ignorant when I hear this term. What does it mean to be middle class? What is your understanding of the term? I need more knowledge and understanding about this...

Everyone will give you a different definition as there is no agreement and there's a huge overlap between working class and middle class these days anyway.

If you are talking about the established middle class it would usually be property owners who's parents and grandparents are also property owners, and are also educated professionals who's parents and grandparents are also educated professionals and the majority of whom's social group also meet those criteria.
They are "established" because they have been middle class for more than one generation and because their children will also be born middle class. Of course very few people meet the criteria exactly these days.

Another way of looking at it is "not upper class, not working class" which is quite simplistic but also leaves a lot of grey area

So I would say in general it would be people who are middle class in terms of family, social group, financial means and education.

Class is simple:

Group A: Chip on their shoulder about class.
......Subgroup A1: Look down on people below them, immaculate houses: Lower Middle.
......Subgroup A2: Look down on people above them: Working.

Group B: Irritatingly self deprecating.
......Subgroup B1: Messy houses, no cleaner, relatively cultured: middle middle class.
......Subgroup B2: Immaculate houses because they have a cleaner, even more cultured, self-segregating: upper middle.

Group C: Smug and self assured:
.....Subgroup C1: Self made (mill|bill)ionare: Captains of Industry
.....Subgroup C2: Came over with the Normans: Native aristocracy
.....Subgroup C3: Other aristocracy

There is also the upper working class who would meet most of those criteria but usually make their money through trades and "lower" professional roles such as nursing, and now teaching.

A doctor, professor, lawyer etc. Would be middle class, but there is some overlap with the upper working class as regards roles such as property developer. Their is also a blurring of the lines due to a lot more people going onto university and/or further study. So lower middle/upper working class are often very similar, and the distinctions would be more social. So lower middle class and upper working class may have the same financial means, but would often spend the money differently. Middle class would be more likely to prioritise education and cultural experiences whereas the upper working class would usually prioritise holidays, 4 wheel drive, big TV etc. Of course most people are not 100% one class or another and most people are somewhere between upper working class and lower middle class in this country, with the minority falling into the true working class, new "benefits" class and the true upper class.

It varies. Probably things like:

• shopping at Waitrose
• going ski-ing
• enjoying things on BBC4
• reading Guardian/Telegraph
• worrying about exam results at local achool cos you can't afford private
• not being bothered about getting latest car
• Center Parcs or the Dordogne

And so on. Many people hate those things. Some aspire to have them.

Think of them as tribes. Its mostly about behaviour and how you spend your money.

Teaching is an established middle class profession. It requires an academic degree and the vast majority have a postgraduate qualification. It’s profoundly depressing that a forum like MN, populated largely by parents, has such a low opinion of the professionals who teach their children.

I think the first reply was right that it is Relates to your parents professions etc. I think a doctor who grew up on a council estate wouldn’t be solidly middle class but their children would be.

How you spend the money? Or how it is acquired?

I'm thinking around the lines of choice and whether you have had the opportunity to have choice.

Of course most people are not 100% one class or another and most people are somewhere between upper working class and lower middle class in this country, with the minority falling into the true working class, new "benefits" class and the true upper class

I think this is it. People always say it's about attitudes to things like education, but I really don't think there is a significant difference in prioritisation of education between the working and middle classes. Just about everyone wants their DCs to do as well as they can at school.

Just about everyone wants their DCs to do as well as they can at school.

That's not true (except in a superficial. "everyone would like to be rich" kind of way). Nor is it linked directly to class. Many parents, both middle class and not middle class treat academic education as unimportant.

The difference between the middle and working class on that front is that a middle class person with poor education has the cultural capital to fit into middle class society - and appear more educated than a working class person who lacking that cultural capital doesn't.

Teaching is an established middle class profession. It requires an academic degree and the vast majority have a postgraduate qualification.

Teaching is a recently middle class profession. It now requires an academic degree for new entrants, but up until the late 1980s there were plenty of two year CertEd courses and a significant proportion, probably a majority in primary, of teachers over fifty do not have degrees. One generation is a blink of an eye in terms of class perception.

Just about everyone wants their DCs to do as well as they can at school.

That is manifestly untrue. There’s a reason why schools in deprived areas are often failing, and the lack of parental support and often active parental undermining of the school is a large part of that.

Teaching is a recently middle class profession. It now requires an academic degree for new entrants, but up until the late 1980s there were plenty of two year CertEd courses and a significant proportion, probably a majority in primary, of teachers over fifty do not have degrees. One generation is a blink of an eye in terms of class perception.

The older teachers always seemed more "educated" than the younger ones when I was in school. Maybe that's just the experience of age though.

Op it's about how the money is acquired and how you spend it, also education, whether you own property etc. When I studied sociology (100yrs ago) there was a straightforward definition but today it seems to be organised a bit more fluidly. At best it's a rough socioeconomic/marketing categorisation based on education, some stuff about your family and how much you're worth.
Quite a good Wiki page about class: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_class_in_the_United_Kingdom
A class survey: www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-22000973

a significant proportion, probably a majority in primary, of teachers over fifty do not have degrees

I would argue that, insofar as they can be separated, this is more a matter of gender than of class.

Teaching was certainly considered a middle-class profession by Cruikshank in 1840: below the Bar and the clergy but alongside the other intellectual professions of medicine, university teaching, literature and art (picture from the British Library).

The older teachers always seemed more "educated" than the younger ones when I was in school.

They were probably still graduates. Cert Ed was only one route into teaching.

I would argue that, insofar as they can be separated, this is more a matter of gender than of class.

Absolutely. Women were directed into teaching via Cert Eds, men into degrees. You can see this in the statistics in the appendices to the Robbins Report, and in the behaviour of local authorities in awarding scholarships (prior to the Robbins Report university funding was at the discretion of local authorities) differentially to men and women.

If it’s about higher level of education, owning property and your profession then it’s hugely fluid and is going to become even more so in the future as younger people who night once have gone to university decide not to because of the fees; and can’t afford to buy a house even with a relatively good salary. Making it a rather meaningless term and categorisation.

It’s also a preserve of white people and British-born people: BME people, in the main, do not tend to preoccupy themselves with class status; and none of my expat friends give a damn whether they’re considered middle class or not. So it’s increasingly becoming something of an irrelevance, certainly among London-based younger people.

BME people, in the main, do not tend to preoccupy themselves with class status

Yeah. There's absolutely no pressure on Pakistani/Bangladeshi heritage students to choose medicine over engineering...

It’s also a preserve of white people and British-born people: BME people, in the main, do not tend to preoccupy themselves with class status

I couldn’t disagree more. It’s my experience that many many children from second-generation immigrant families, especially (but not exclusively) of Asian heritage, are under tremendous pressure to succeed academically and to study a traditional middle-class profession at university, especially engineering, medicine, dentistry etc.

I think that increasingly it has precious little to do with finances.
My two friends as an example; one co founded a small business with her husband, seemingly has quite a lot of disposable income which she spends on her immaculate new build house, leasing mercs and jags, going on holiday multiple times per year to all inclusive resorts, eating out at Frankie and Benny's, Prezzo etc and detailing the minutiae of her life on her facebook.
Her children are dressed immaculately, intricate hairstyles for the girls, sportswear for her son.
My other friend is a university educated (lower) professional, her partner works part time but is also university educated.
The live in a period home which although beautiful is very much 'lived in' and only worth two thirds of my other friends' new build. She drives a six year old peoole carrier and they holiday at Center Parcs.
Her children wear clothes from anywhere really but I notice that they are good quality and are often passed from child to child.
Her daughter's have frankly wild hair and her boys hair is rather long.

Whilst friend one has more money and a more lavish lifestyle she remains working class whilst my other friend is obviously (to me) more middle class.

@ThanksItHasPockets

I didn't say teaching should be upper working class/ lower middle but it is. Because of how much our government seem to think they deserve to be paid, not because of the value it has to me.
I think nurses should be paid better and valued more too.

Teaching used to be an established middle class profession such as doctor/lawyer but I think it is wrong to say it still is.

The majority of my family are teachers, but they are also not established middle class. Most of them are very well educated, yes, but also fairly badly paid for the work they do which I think is abhorrent but has changed their class in that whilst my parents generation of teachers could mostly afford to own property and live a middle class lifestyle, many my generation simply cannot.

A family used to be able to live comfortably off one teachers salary, now most would struggle to live comfortably on two teachers salaries. I think that is disgusting and shows how teaching has become a massively undervalued area despite it being incredibly important. What I was commenting on was definitions of class which not whether I agree with them or not.

I wasn't coming from a place of superiority either, I am nowhere near established middle class. Although I am educated and do read/ watch BBC4/ eat avocados etc. 😂

A family used to be able to live comfortably off one teachers salary

When? My parents were teachers starting in the late 1950s, although my father quickly moved to FE. We certainly didn't live a life of luxury on two teaching salaries in the 1970s.

It's never been as well paid as medicine or the law. Ever.

@dolliebauble both

The upper class mostly inherit their wealth, titles, etc.

The upper middle class inherit some of and earn some of their wealth, helped by their social capital

The lower middle class may inherit a little of but mostly earn their wealth,their social capital is higher than working class but not as high as the upper middle or upper classes

The upper working class are unlikely to inherit any of and will earn their wealth, despite lesser social capital which will make this harder than the middle classes

The lower working class won't inherit any wealth and will earn what they can, limited by their limited to no social capital
They are largely manual workers

The under class won't inherit or earn any wealth and have limited to no social capital.

Traditionally in one generation you could move up one class group to the next but not two. Therefore to be upper middle class, your grandparents would normally have to be upper working class at least. However, the class system has much more wriggle room than it used to. It would be impossible to go from the "bottom" to the "top" though, as essentially the upper class is still the most difficult to enter within a limited generational span.

@ReflectentMonatomism

I said "comfortably" not "life of luxury"

By comfortable I mean can afford to run a house and car, have the occasional holiday and not worry if the boiler needs repairing or shoes need replacing

& my grandparents generation could
My parents generation it was harder
My generation it's incredibly difficult/ impossible