Does being married to a doctor make you middle class?

[GirlGeorgina]

Like if you got married to a doctor (who is male) and you’re not a doctor yourself, does it make you middle class now?

I am not married but someone who is marrying a doctor but not a doctor herself said it makes you middle class too.

Yes it does - YANBU

No it doesn’t - YABU

What if the doctor is working class? 🤔

What's the obsession with being middle class, it's all a bit pathetic, isn't it?

Is being a doctor the very definition of middle class, then?! I think not 😂

No, it doesn’t unless you have middle class values.

Income doesn’t denote class.

This!

Does anybody care? Well clearly the person marrying the doctor I suppose!

What are middle class values?

Yes I suppose she is marrying into middle class and will live that lifestyle now. Assuming her partner is middle class. I wouldn't however automatically assume every doctor is middle class and you're middle class just by being a doctor or marrying one

Well, professional I should say does’t always 🙄but hopefully you get the point.

She sounds very immature 😞

So she’s working class? In which case maybe her husband to be will become working class by marrying her? 😁

I would say no, not initially. Class is more than income and it’s more than your partner.

From my outside observation, as someone who does not live in the UK, it seems like people don't want to be middle class they would much rather be considered working class. It's very weird though. Who cares what "class" you are?

I hope so, otherwise what's the point?

What's the point??

@BlueKaftan In the UK, for starters an obsession with becoming anything but…

The middle class is often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status.

So in this case, HE has the right occupation, maybe Income, definitely education and maybe social status.

She might eventually have that as well, but if she is not educated, I don't think the other areas will make up for it.

Whether educated or not, she does sound quite dim

It's not just about occupation. The doctor himself may not be middle class.

In the real world, rightly or wrongly, people will initially assess your class based on first impressions of accent and background.

An old school friend of mine ( no longer) married a GP then stopped working.. she thought she was then upper class and became a snobby cow and looked down on me and others..

Are doctors middle class? They do shifts, are paid overtime and generally have no management responsibility. The very definition of working class I’d have thought 😂

Though, seriously, what is middle class nowadays anyway… Doctors come from all backgrounds, but by the time they make it to consultant they almost all have middle class lifestyles. Marrying one doesn’t automatically make you middle class, though I expect after time you’d assume a middle class lifestyle, and take up skiing, holidaying in the south of France, having supper not tea/dinner and drive a Volvo or Mercedes (not necessarily very new) to drop the children off at prep school ;)

I’m not even sure being a doctor is middle class let alone being married to one.
I’m assuming you mean medical doctor rather than a real doctor with P.hd/D.phil

I would say being a doctor is middle class. It's a tough profession that often runs in families and people are usually set on the career path from very young.

It is academically very challenging and often requires a lot of support, which is why it has remained quite a privileged career path.

Of course you do get people from working class backgrounds becoming doctors, but it's not as common, and for the reasons above can be harder for them - so very well done to them.

There is a certain amount of kudos / respect to being a doctor and I don't think working shifts / having no managerial responsibilities negates this, as a pp suggested.

As for marrying a doctor though. I guess if a working class person marries a doctor and aspires to middle class values they could become middle class. But that's not a given. It's not really any guarantee of anything.

Well seeing as no-one can agree definitively what middle class values or life styles are and marrying a doctor wouldn't change a person's values, interest or upbringing then how would it change their class?

And yes, what if the doctor is working class? In the early stages of their career, their salary is pretty poor for a graduate professional and if they have DC and she is a SAHM and they rent, they'll likely be entitled to universal credit, so while one of them has a worthy professional job, a couple where one of them doesn't work and they're claiming top up benefits doesn't sound like a stereotypical middle class family does it?

Does it make a difference if the doctor is female and she marries a footballer, brickie, train driver or workshy posho?

I’m with @WelshNerd , it’s the only thing I have to offer a potential suitor 😜

Of course a doctor is middle class. They may have been born and raised working class, and able to tick the box about the main earner in their household at age 12 being blue collar which is how it's worked out for public sector funding etc. but once they're a doctor, they're middle-class as are their wife and kids. As someone once told Alan Clarke - 'you can't be a working class film director' - it's not a working class job. Which doesn't mean Clarke wasn't from the working classes and couldn't portray them authentically but once he was directing for the BBC, he wasn't in a working class role any more.

As for values, that's where it gets dodgy so I wouldn't get into it. There's nothing about working classes that mean uneducated or not valuing art and literature etc. Look at the workers libraries and so on. But it is about income and occupation so a professional like doctor isn't ever going to be working class.

Your friends class would be defined by her occupation. However, if his is the only job in the house, she can choose to go with the traditional approach of taking her social class from her husband's occupation and defining as MC; or the more progressive one of defining it from her own (lack of) occupation, which would make her economically inactive.

Is she a genteel member of the aristocracy concerned she is ruining the bloodline by marrying beneath her? A well bred lady will never lose her class through marriage. Have you never watched Downtown Abbey?

The threads on class here make me cringe my skin off.