What makes you working class?

[Bdueb]

Was listening to an interview with oa well known actor talking about their childhood and growing up working class. For them a key part was lack of travel and having not left their local area much etc. That was 20 years ago. What about now - what do you think distinguishes working and middle class childhoods of today?

Not sure about nurses but teachers are very middle class.

Not having an inheritance when parents pass on. It absolutely separates working class from the middle.

Whilst I agree with the school of thought that middle class is not having to work (although may do through choice but not because you have to) to sustain a lifestyle, inheritance is a tricky one as if there are several children, it may not go far enough!

But MC having passive income such as through shares, trust funds, investments etc to sustain the lifestyle. What someone else said - WC is having to work for someone, MC you don't.

Yet I know MC people whose whole inheritance has been eaten in care home fees. Does that suddenly make them WC ?

@chocolatespreadsandwich

Those that did have an inheritance but it gets consumed by care home fees - yes, they are m/class I suppose because the inheritance was once there.

It doesn't make them w/class it makes them unfortunate.

Ohh they'd be turning in their graves being called anything other than working class! Bless 'em.

Also because they were both the first in their families to be given the chance to go to University/College.

Solaire18381 · Today 02:03

Whilst I agree with the school of thought that middle class is not having to work (although may do through choice but not because you have to) to sustain a lifestyle, inheritance is a tricky one as if there are several children, it may not go far enough!
But MC having passive income such as through shares, trust funds, investments etc to sustain the lifestyle. What someone else said - WC is having to work for someone, MC you don't.

Nonsense. MC does NOT mean not having to work. If so, that would make brain surgeons, judges, teachers, bankers, farmers, nurses, chartered accountants, working class.
By tradition, it's not simply WORK that defines your class, but rather, how you choose to spend your money.

Yes, totally agree.

@Tabbyandwhite Yes I have nurses & teachers in the family too. They would hate to be called Middle Class.

Your parents before you, going to work. You go to work nearly 30 years before said incident.

Had to giggle the DWP acknowledge I can’t use a bath due to spinal injury.
my hair is matted to the point it stinks but do the DWP mind. No.

Just told my Mum early hours of Boxing Day I don’t qualify for help after waiting 20+ months for some help. (Wrongly thought)

Solaire18381 · Today 02:35

Yes I have nurses & teachers in the family too. They would hate to be called Middle Class.

(Sigh...) the old inverted snobbery...
Why would they "hate it"?

I'm working class and the difference is we don't give a shit about our or anyone else's class, only the middle class seems desperate for this social status. As the saying goes no matter how big your house is, how new your car is, how big your bank account is our graves will all be the same size so stay humble.

I think much of the confusion lies in the fact that class used to be connected to a linage or bloodline rather than lifestyle. So Oliver Twist is Victorian middle class due to his mother’s bloodline, despite the fact he was born in a workhouse. Nicholas Nickleby is impoverished but states he is the son of a gentleman. Tess of the durbervilles turns out to be from an aristocratic family despite working on a farm, which somehow makes her different from the others.
This means that someone could be drunk and destitute but still belong to the upper classes through blood.
I guess now we have swapped bloodline for various other markers like cultural tastes and accents, but it kind of means that a working class person can lead a middle class lifestyle but not feel part of that identity, and an aristocrat can wear rags but not be mistaken for working class

When I was a kid, middle class was white collar workers. Upper class was aristocracy, and working class was everyone else. Today, it's different as the world is finally coming to value blue collar workers and remunerate them accordingly, changing the financial balance in society. When I hear someone say they're middle class or even upper middle class 🤥 it sounds incredibly cringeworthy to me.

I live in the middle of a large council estate.

We have a fantastic community centre / community shop and the volunteers work miracles.

In the school holidays they run play schemes / activities / feed the kids at lunch time.

And I think what you do in the school holidays can be a big indicator of 'class'.

Do you go to the local community centre and learn to swim in a big paddling pool or do you go abroad where there is a real swimming pool?

The cost of getting passports means that a lot of people around here never go abroad. Some do and a lot of people are in work so can afford some luxuries.

The community centre had a 'Tea with Santa' so I think that's another thing. Where do you go to meet Santa? Local community centre of Harrods?

Ok - my DP is so quintessentially working class he may as well wear a flat cap and have a ferret permanently attached to the inside of his trouser leg.

Here comes the numbers to be ticked off on the working class bingo card, folks:

Both parents totally uneducated (in the ‘formal’ education sense) - and very likely, illiterate

Grew up on a rough council estate

Went to a school where there’s a lot of pupils on free school meals and rough working class kids (not my words - I’ve seen this in print) who had no interest in education - a school where lots of violence took place and consequently gets dismal results

Left school at minimum age with very few exam passes

Father in manual, unskilled cash in hand job paying below the average wage for the time

When he grew up, father went to pub a lot - on his return he could hear his parents having drunken arguments downstairs

Looked at family pictures of Xmases from the late 70s yesterday of DP’s Dad and his whole dress/demeanour looks working class - eg beer glass in hand/wearing a large cygnet ring etc ..

Parents got married when his Mum was 17 - she had DP’s older brother at 18

DP one of 5 kids - parents Irish Catholic immigrants

DP’s Dad cannot for the life of him understand someone who would do a ‘creative’ job like artist/poet etc

Parents have strong Irish accents

All my DP’s siblings have virtually no academic qualifications between all 5 of them

Parents fav pastime when DP was growing up was the pub :)

DP has VERY strong regional accent - you practically need a Black and Decker saw to saw through it - **says ‘wiv’ for ‘with’ and ‘maffs’ for ‘maths’ etc…

All the working class ‘bingo’ numbers now crossed off -

Can I get an Amen?????!! 🤣

Well to complicate matters, I’ve always heard of upper middle class and lower middle class.. with lower middle class owning their own home and being able to afford basic holidays but living month to month and not much extra in savings… and upper middle class owning investments and some possibly sending kids to fee paying schools etc. working class would be not owning their own home and living month to month working low paid jobs, or receiving benefits.
but honestly I hope we are moving away from this system as does it really matter?!

Also it’s hard for me to type this - but DP parents not at all ‘PC’ - think casual homophobia etc

The responses here are why I don’t think there’s any room in the world for the UK’s outdated traditional class system. Most people I know don’t give a stuff about it.

I’m from a family of manual workers, my Dad was a really well respected engineer in his field, professionally qualified but no uni back in the day because people from his background didn’t go to uni 70 years ago. My mum’s family were as poor as church mice but she passed the 11+, went to grammar school and taught music, no university there either, just a very talented pianist, music exams paid for by the church poor fund.

I’ve got a PhD, good salary, lovely lifestyle and a sizeable mortgage that means I need to work until I’m 68 in a job that is really stressful.

Class confuses me so much. My dad was a vicar so as far as I can figure out that made me middle class, but I've spent several years living on the breadline and worked as a cleaner and now an aircraft mechanic which seems working class to me. At what point do your parents stop defining your class and instead you define your own? Or do I remain middle class because of my parents and my children are working class because of theirs?

Oh wow, woke up to so many replies.I guess maybe parents renting will be a key marker in the future. With almost 50% kids going to uni, I wonder whether education is no longer such a marker for today's kids. I feel like middle class families are just as likely to use vinted and charity shops as working classes even if it's due to environmental reasons. The cut off for free school meals is so low that very few kids qualify whether they are working class or not.

Working class - if you're struggling with money and the COL it's all your own fault, if you work in a position that's low paid but society demands it's because of your poor choices and that you spend it all on instant gratification and things you don't need. You're lazy and uninspired, don't work hard enough or make any sacrifices.

Middle class - if you're struggling with money and the COL it's everyone else's fault, you're supporting everyone else and getting nothing in return. You automatically deserve a certain lifestyle and other people are depriving you of it. You're hardworking and you've sacrificed a lot to get where you are, but you might as well give it up for a low paid job because life is so much easier then.

My partner grew up as a cockney kid of uneducated immigrant parents on a rough council estate and left with next to no qualifications from a ‘violent’ school with a terrible rep - he didn’t even consider doing A levels - he’d have been more likely to fly to the moon !

His niece graduated with a First Class degree ..

Dear God - what a difference a generation makes ..

What annoys me currently is the number of celebrities and others that wish to boost their working class credentials to boost credibility when on every measure they are middle class. Ant and Dec, Vernon Kay, Paddy McGuiness.....the list goes on.....all using working class backgrounds as a source of their commercially successful idenity.

A lot of people who consider themselves working class are actually middle class and indeed we have the worrying development of an underclass that to an extent replaced the old working class.

Omg your first sentence is m
SO BANG ON ..

but the people I’m thinking off were much more MC than the examples you’ve quoted - all those grew up WC I think