Is being a registered nursen a working class occupation

[BubbleIceTea]

I've spent the morning reading through the Lucy Letby press conference thread, 40 pages long.
In the thread, one poster has stated that registered nurses are working class, in a working class occupation.
Is this true?
I'm shocked by this.
I've always regarded trained registered nursing as a resolutely middle class occupation.

When I trained at a prestigious London teaching hospital back in the late 1970's it was very definitely (mostly) resolutely middle class. We had girls (no boys back then) in my set who had been to private schools, convent schools etc and one at least whose family lived in a stately home! There were a few from working class backgrounds but not many. This was long before the training became a degree course and at a time when very few people went to university at all. I don't think it was necessarily like this at other non-teaching hospitals though, when I moved back home afterwards and worked at our local hospital the demographic was very different.

Who cares? What on earth is class anyway?

I care.
I think it really matters.

I would say working class. It was the doctors who were middle. But I’ve met lots of nicely spoken nurses who were clearly from middle class families. They were the ones who married the doctors and fulfilled their family’s aspirations.

Thats an attitude of privilege. I experience class prejudice almost daily (I work in a very MC area). Class disadvantage is real.

Why does it matter to you?

Genuinely interested

I think nursing was one of the few careers open to women in the past. It was probably a role that ‘clever girls’ did instead of university.

so I’d say it was a mixed background. I think most of the nurses I know are working class, but some very posh women would also have been nurses. A bit like secretaries and typists of my mother’s generation.

Princess Diana was a nanny, but would say Nannie’s are working class! So just shows it’s very complicated!

Being a nurse is not any class, why is this even a question ?

I would say it’s a professional occupation and in the traditional classes I’d say it’s middle class. It may start as a rubbish wage but people progress up the bands and you need a university degree. Deffo not working class, I think working class people who become nurses would be upwardly mobile

Nurses are working class. Doctors are middle class. Typically. You can tell by the accent and appearance and body language and first name. Of course this is not always the case and there are many exceptions but I live in Liverpool and most nurses have Scouse accents and most doctors do not.

It would be a relatively upper WC person who became a nurse though, there will be an additional layer of people "below" nurses who wouldn't aspire to a degree so would do unskilled work.

All this is of course deeply unfair and does not reflect people's true worth or abilities, it's all a result of the oppression of the working classes during the industrial revolution. It's probably also different in other regions but in the north west I think this is true. Posh nurses probably go for more upmarket areas!

Why would it be any class? There are people from all different classes if you want to define it doing it so what in itself makes it one or the other?

I don’t think it’s about the type of people who go in to nurses, it’s about what class they become. Other factors play a part in class but occupation is a big one. So if someone working class becomes a nurse, ends up on a decent wage, married to someone at the same level and so are able to buy a house, they’d be bringing up middle class kids, rather than working class

It’s not about accents, scouse people can be middle class. Also my understanding is that doctors don’t get to choose where they work until they become consultants. While they are still in their training years they are sent all around the country. Which could account for the different accents in Liverpool. I’m sure there’s plenty of doctors with scouse accents, especially because some working class people become doctors too

I think nursing is quite classless, my mum was a nursing student in the 70s and from a lower middle class background. All the other student nurses were middle class too, a lot of them far posher than my mum! It was considered a respectable career for a middle class girl back then and lots of them did it in order to find a doctor to marry!

These days I would say it's a middle class job because it requires a degree and is skilled, but people from working and middle class backgrounds will become nurses so you'll get a different answer depending who you ask.

Nurses now have degrees so probably middle class. Some are also consultants and highly specialised.

I have SILs who are or were nurses before they retired.

They were all privately educated at some point unlike the "oinks" of my brothers they married. One had a titled father.

Maybe historically over the last few decades it looked a bit different? Or maybe it depends where you're from in the country 🤷

Interesting! Traditionally it's a working class role. I'm not sure how much a degree changes that... because for sure having a degree used to make you MC, but now when 50% go to uni...

Anecdata: all the nurses I know - from their 20s to retired - are WC or wealthy, I don't know any MC nurses!

On a related note, my sibling at A-level or maybe 1st year uni sociology did a thing very similar about police. Can you be a long-serving PC on £40k and still be WC? Because you're WC by background but by salary (where we're from) that makes you MC. But then can you not have a WC PC? When does it change?

Depends were you are from in the country.

I am from London.

I know when I was ferrying one of my nephews to look at universities outside London because his parents couldn't, we met people who were going to do nursing degrees. They had a complete mixed bag of backgrounds. My nephew is in his mid-20s.

What makes you think the working classes were not oppressed before the industrial revolution?😊

I always think of the guy who used to run Pimilico Plumbers or premiership footballers when it comes down to class and money in the UK.

In the UK class is about education so they are almost all WC even though they are millionaires, there as in the US they are MC. The only way their class would change in the UK is if they got a title.

In the UK? Everything. Currently our Labour government has decided ordinary children shouldn't learn Latin as it's elitist. I can't imagine anything more elitist than that - but the main point I am making is that if you want to get on knowing who Cinna was is a surprisingly great help. (Clue: ploughs and Mr Boris Johnson)

I disagree. Background, accent, family wealth, education etc has a lot to do with class. You can change lanes but mostly people keep the trappings of the class they were born into.

Nursing is a degree educated profession now. So @Namechangean is right.

Though on the other hand I have a few friends and acquaintances who have married/partnered with men who aren't degree/degree equivalent educated and do well paid WC jobs.