To have no clue how to refer to "average people" in this country

[missingmiddle]

I'm new to the UK and I am really struggling with understanding what people mean by "middle class" here.

To me it means - an average family, house in the suburbs, commuting to a boring suburban job, maybe accountants or teachers with kids in state schools or maybe a smart kid on a scholarship. Not struggling too hard to pay the bills and not on benefits (aside from perhaps the wide-ranging ones like child tax credits) but they're expecting to take all 30 years to pay off the mortgage. Enjoy going camping, cinema, dinners with friends etc

In the UK it seems to mean - City professionals/lawyers/bankers who shop at Waitrose and go to the opera and take multiple foreign holidays a year. Children at private/public school, skiing and piano lessons... To me this is upper middle class.

I suppose here the first family is called "working class" but then so are families who are really struggling with money? Do British people just not observe the difference?

You are being unreasonable for starting this thread. There are soooo many threads on this topic on MN. A simple search would have provided you will all the discussion you need.

Having a car at 17 doesn't make you 'properly rich' and living in a detached bungalow in a low cost of living area and a parent who went to uni doesn't make you posh. I'd say 'lower middle' is accurate.

Have you ever met anyone who is actually wealthy?

I don't agree that it's a north/south thing. I do agree that a lot of southerners think a northern accent is automatically 'common', but I think your idea of wealth and what makes someone upper class is way off.

Agree with @ZeldaFighter. I think if you're Irish the assumption is made you're working class, for example. I've witnessed incredulity at the very idea that there are fee-paying schools in Ireland too. All very strange.

Given that “snobby” means fawningly admiring your social superiors or vulgarly seeking association with them, to claim the upper classes are not snobby is a prime example of stating the bloody obvious because you have absolutely no idea what you are really talking about. Obviously you have no need to fawn over yourself - you are secure in the knowledge of your own superiority, as your forebears designed the class system in the first place with the intention that you should always be at the top of it.

Lol, at all the people sneeringly asking why you want to know and pretending it's not a thing. Of course people don't fit into neat little boxes, but class is still a thing and there's no pretending it's not. Especially as without acknowledging it it's harder to break down barriers.
OP, I'd call the teacher group lower middle class.

Exactly! If we ever talked about class, we'd have to acknowledge that we have no meritocracy, no social ability and socially, we are essentially still in the medieval age of Lords and peasants.

social mobility

Obviously you have no need to fawn over yourself - you are secure in the knowledge of your own superiority, as your forebears designed the class system in the first place with the intention that you should always be at the top of it.

I see the idea on mn that UC or UCM or whatever term are always less snobby or nicer than MC or lower MC etc, it comes up a lot. They don’t pretend to be something they’re not etc

But of course it’s easier to do this if you are at the very top of the pile. But I doubt there’s any risk of anyone saying ok I’ll relinquish my spot

Read Consumed by Harry wallop and Class by Jilly cooper.

The first group you decide are lower middle class, who have probably worked their way up from working class (but find themselves slipping back down now to working class given cost of living - i.e back to shopping at lidl, no holidays or very cheap ones)

The second group you describe are upper middle class.

Most ordinary peoole in society are working class I would say.

I wonder whether part of the questions about class in relation to the group traditionally considered upper class is that they are such a small group. Surely even at enclaves such as Eton and Harrow there can't be that many future Baronets? Most I would imagine would be kids of company owners or other extremely wealthy individuals. Then most people becoming titled in the modern era come from all sorts of groups. Paul McCartney, Lord Sugar, Dame Mirren etc...3 classes does seem pretty useless...my grandmother always talked about being respectable working class as though respect would some how keep the lights on and fridge full.

There are more than you'd think. Apparently there are over 600 aristocratic families in the UK. I went to a university where lots of the 'rahs' went and I was always surprised by how many there were. Quite a few of them were landed gentry.

@pixie5121 600 is alot more than I thought to be fair, I assumed those lines would be getting swallowed up into the middle as time went on over the last century or so.

Given that “snobby” means fawningly admiring...

I could believe that paragraph might have been written by a Bot.
My definition of snobby WC or MC person is someone who believes "My tribe is the best and other tribes are inferior". Although the MC person might not be very obvious towards the WC persons in showing this prejudice.

Your definition of snobby is not the actual meaning of the word snobby… but hey, if you like to invent your own personal meaning for words, go ahead.

Conceited is a more accurate description of what you think “snobby” means, @lljkk . If you were actually born in the UK, which I don’t think you were, you might better understand the chip on shoulder aspect of snobbery that your personal interpretation apparently fails to comprehend.

Is being conceited a nicer attribute to have than having a chip on shoulder? I suppose that's fair enough. chronic resentment is an ugly characteristic.

MNers invent their own definitions of words all the time. That is very chronic, too. Countless examples. Should I find some?

ps: I always thought that conceited was a personal thing not about one's entire tribe. Maybe arrogant is a more precise word that I should use?

Google is trying to suggest words like Ethnocentrism or cultural arrogance.

@lljkk - yes, chronic resentment is a very ugly characteristic, and the by-product of an outdated class system. The class system that exists in people’s heads no longer fully equates to reality, so it is now a laughable collection of spiteful, toxic prejudices that get in the way of proper discourse and often serve to enable the real holders of the levers of power to get away with all sorts of atrocious behaviours while the people cling to their old fashioned notions of who to blame and resent for it instead of facing reality. And this all plays out at the inane level of judging people by the supermarket they shop in, the music they listen to, the clothes they wear, the way they talk, etc, because that’s how people identify what class someone’s ancestors belonged to, when the class system made sense, because it kept people in their place.

Yes that. Perfectly explained.