Upper, middle, or working class?

[Greycatgingercat]

I was speaking to another parent at DD's nursery and she said that she was upper class. Her husband is a doctor and she does embroidery but mentioned that she also uses dr as her title. She's a lovely lady and we work in similar fields as I run a small business making children's cloths.

I'd never really spoken about class before this, so it prompted me to have a conversation with my mother. I'd consider myself working class but my mother would consider herself middle class, as her father was a head teacher yet she never worked after I was born so after my father left we relied on benefits.

The lady at DD's nursery is originally form Pakistan, but has lived in the UK for 7 years so I'm not sure if it's more of a cultural thing her telling me her class.

What class would you consider yourself as and what do you think makes someone a particular social class?

newnewnewbuild
Sorry, I made some assumptions which were wrong and shouldn't have.
Sounds like your parents are working class and probably you too, by background, but as a "climber" I think your kids will be lower middle class.
It is interesting isn't it!

Oh and just to join the chorus, I agree with RaspberryMuffin too.

@Lelophants

I thought Upper class was multimillionaire or beaurocracy? She must mean upper class in Pakistan as it must be a different system.

I’m howling! I’m glad someone said it!

I can highly recommend Kate Fox’s “watching the English” for a good summary of class.

The most obnoxious book I ever read. It was all about her blabbing on about how she’s upper middle so basically the same as the upper class and looking down on/ridiculing people she perceived to be below her in the pecking order.

lower class are likely to have had free school meals or been fed in the army/ prison

What a load of rubbish !

This is why class is such nonsense ,if you are living a middle class life style you can consider yourself whatever you want but most people will see you as middle class and I people in nice houses high wages ,etc etc consider themselves working class what do they think of those of us who don't have same lifestyle ?

[[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppv97S3ih14

I'd love to know what she makes of me.

Educated to barely end of secondary school initially and went to work at 17. Single parent barely scraping by some weeks with nothing until pay day. Now I'm a self made multimillionaire. I still consider myself working class!

@anotheremma no problem at all I obviously left some info out of my original post which left some pretty gaps in my background, I was just conscious that I'd already written a very long post!

That's an interesting point - perhaps for me it will be the case that each generation will be a slightly "higher" class than the one before. Maybe my great great great great grand children will end up being part of the aristocracy

DP and I have bought a house (with a mortgage) and earn nearly 100k between us. I am educated to AS Level then dropped out, he didn't take GCSEs. Both of us grew up in households that relied on benefits and council housing. I personally would see myself as working class got lucky... BBC calculator says I'm established middle class so that's nonsense. Without our jobs we wouldn't have any of what we do, so I couldn't consider myself anything other than working, though I don't know if that would be tiered in any way. The woman you met OP is probably more focused on caste than class if she's from Pakistan.

It's quite straightforward tbh.
If society as a whole is biased against you based on your class, eg access to education, wages, promotion etc, you're probably working class. And acknowledging that inequality or achievement despite it, is the only time it is important.

Otherwise, if you think your class is important or something to boast about, you're probably lower middle class, regardless of whether you describe yourself as middle or upper.

ROFLMAO

[quote newnewnewbuild]@anotheremma no problem at all I obviously left some info out of my original post which left some pretty gaps in my background, I was just conscious that I'd already written a very long post!

That's an interesting point - perhaps for me it will be the case that each generation will be a slightly "higher" class than the one before. Maybe my great great great great grand children will end up being part of the aristocracy [/quote]

@KeeefBurtain

Richard Osman wrote recently that it depends on what time you opened your Christmas presents - the earlier in the day the lower the class

This made me howl 👏

She is middle class. Upper class is the aristocracy and very few fall into that category.

Not that this class rubbish matters anymore.

@JoJoSM2

I’m not sure about other caste systems in Pakistan but it’s perfectly possible that she would be considered upper class in her homeland but not here.

Why not here? She could be a Pakistani upper class person.

Just like an upper class English person going abroad doesn’t become another class because they aren’t part of the local system.

This is the key point. Other countries have other standards. We are attuned to British class indicators, but that doesn’t fit here. So all the anecdotes about what class lots of British people are, or consider themselves to be, are irrelevant.

It’s quite likely that this woman told you about it because it’s very important to her, and she thought (rightly) that you wouldn’t realise her ‘status’ without her telling you.

I think it just goes to show that a) most countries have a class system of some kind and b) just how nonsensical all the ‘rules’ can seem, when you are the outsider looking in.

A doctor is middle class unless they come from an upper class background I suppose. Who on earth announces what 'class' they fit into? I've never done or experienced that before, it is most odd.

Well, I'm working class, of course.

You'd be hard pushed to find somebody from Liverpool who doesn't describe themselves as such tbh.

sad class.
An embarrassment.

Embroidery. Jesus wept.

It is not Pakistani culture to inform you of what class they are.

Like most developing countries you have extremes.
You have some who have lots of money and a large majority who are very poor and without a welfare system.

So lots with money want to tell you are are part of the elite.

But a doctor is a.middle class profession. One that hopefully is filled with kind empathetic people who not too worried about class.

The classes, explained by someone who doesn't live in a country with a class system:
Basse class: People struggling with chaos, poverty and addiction. Living hand to mouth.
Working class: people who work all day every day just to pay rent and for cheap consumer items. Usually holding credit card or other high-interest debt.
Middle class: people who work almost all the time for someone else but who don't work nights or weekends and who sometimes have a holiday overseas. Often in debt, with a mortgage or a carloan.
Upper middle: surgeons, dentists, partners in law firms etc. Still working for someone else and kidding themselves that they're rich. Often making stupid financial decisions like buying a boat instead of a portfolio.
Upper class: People with a big enough pool of assets that they don't need a job to generate enough income to live well, including multiple overseas holidays and a second or third home in a desirable location. Sometimes these guys work for fun.
Royalty and peerage: born into it.

And here's the modern class system:
The 0.01 percent
The 1 percent
and everyone else.

review.chicagobooth.edu/economics/2017/article/never-mind-1-percent-lets-talk-about-001-percent

@Guineapigbridge

The classes, explained by someone who doesn't live in a country with a class system: Basse class: People struggling with chaos, poverty and addiction. Living hand to mouth. Working class: people who work all day every day just to pay rent and for cheap consumer items. Usually holding credit card or other high-interest debt. Middle class: people who work almost all the time for someone else but who don't work nights or weekends and who sometimes have a holiday overseas. Often in debt, with a mortgage or a carloan. Upper middle: surgeons, dentists, partners in law firms etc. Still working for someone else and kidding themselves that they're rich. Often making stupid financial decisions like buying a boat instead of a portfolio. Upper class: People with a big enough pool of assets that they don't need a job to generate enough income to live well, including multiple overseas holidays and a second or third home in a desirable location. Sometimes these guys work for fun. Royalty and peerage: born into it.

This is only part of the picture because it only considers work, income and wealth. It omits education level and generational factors (ie "old money" v "new money") which are also key.

[quote Guineapigbridge]And here's the modern class system:
The 0.01 percent
The 1 percent
and everyone else.

review.chicagobooth.edu/economics/2017/article/never-mind-1-percent-lets-talk-about-001-percent[/quote]
That's not a class system, that's just economics.

Class really isn’t anything to do with money. You can be poor upper class or rich lower class.

The upper class are listed in debret (sp?), the middle are professionals and the lower workers.