To ask what class you think you are?

[IHate]

People always say everyone on MN is middle class, but are we?! I honestly think it’s a pretty socioeconomically diverse mix.

What class would you say you are? Curious how people map themselves when you take both background and current life into account.

These are the rough descriptions I’m working from (from Reddit - I didn’t write them, so please don’t come for me 🤣). Heritage first, income last.

Upper class
Old families, land, inherited wealth, public schools, Oxbridge, connections that run through generations. Sparse vowels, quiet confidence, and a sense that everything important happens in drawing rooms you will never see.

Typical household income: irrelevant, wealth is inherited.

Likelihood of two parent families: very high.

Age at first child: early thirties.

Upper middle class
Professionals with long-standing pedigree. Parents and grandparents were doctors, civil servants, academics, barristers, consultants, senior military. Private or grammar schooling, strong cultural capital, instinctive ease in elite spaces. This is the group most people mean when they say “middle class”.

Typical household income: often £150k plus.

Likelihood of two parent families: high. Age at first child: early to mid thirties.

Middle class
Educated, comfortable, but not posh. Teachers, mid-level civil servants, senior nurses, managers, small business owners. Cultural capital is mixed. Grandparents may have been skilled workers. Big on gardens, National Trust, and well-behaved children.

Typical household income: around £90k to £150k.

Likelihood of two parent families: moderate to high.

Age at first child: late twenties to early thirties.

Lower middle class
Clerical, admin, retail management, entry-level professional families. Polite, aspirational, very aware of class boundaries. Parents or grandparents often from working class backgrounds. Transitional rather than settled.

Typical household income: around £60k to £90k.

Likelihood of two parent families: mixed.

Age at first child: mid to late twenties.

Working class
Manual trades, industrial work, care work, service work. Strong community identity, distinctive humour, bluntness valued over polish. Heritage is key. You can earn millions and remain working class because class is about where you come from, not what you now earn.

Typical household income: usually under £60k, though can be higher.

Likelihood of two parent families: lower than middle groups.

Age at first child: late teens to mid twenties.

Precariat
Insecure work, unstable housing, gig economy. Identity varies, but the instability itself defines the experience.

Typical household income: under £25k.

Likelihood of two parent families: low.

Age at first child: late teens to mid twenties.

I’m solidly working class. Also, if discussions about class make you cross, this is probably not the thread for you.

No idea.

I was born in a nice middle class family (parents were both university lecturers) but some horrible things happened to me and I ended up homeless, worked on the streets, lived in a refuge, and have only just clawed my way up to a council estate as a single mother earning quite a lot less than £25k.

I don't fit in where I was born and I don't fit in where I live now really.

Working class though I don't recognise myself at all in your description 🤷‍♀️

Somewhere in between upper middle and middle middle (middle upper middle class?!). Unfortunately because everything has become far more expensive, we won't be able to afford our parents lifestyles (we went to private schools but our children won't, our house won't be as nice).

Oh goody, a really original thread topic

I consider myself working class. Mum was a cleaner. Council house upbringing in East London. Didn't go to university. My circumstances now are a world away from my upbringing, but I feel class is more about a feeling, than stuff.

My household income is very much in your working class range, but I am definitely middle to upper middle. Boarding school, Oxbridge, two further degrees, family money.

Lower middle class. The only thing stopping me from achieving middle class is the fact I don’t own my own home.

not my fault on account of being gazumped

According to that Reddit description I’m lower middle class

when I did the BBC Class survey about 10 years ago I was in the ‘Elite’ band, largely because I go to ballet/opera/plays at least once a month 🤷‍♀️

There is nothing elite about me apart from the fact my main source of entertainment spending is on live action that isn’t sport

According to your post I’m middle class.

I think my favourite ever one of these was one about how where you put the fruit bowl gives it away. Tons of "I'm related to a duchess and this is where posh people put it", "Only commoners wouldn't go and pluck fruit daily from their private orchard" and all that.

Anyway, should be fun.

We are working class by your distinctions. I would qualify us as working class too.

I'm many.

I was born to a long established family with land. Owned 3 houses. However not a pot to piss in as all money tied up in the land and little cash. Father died, brought up by mother who earned minimum wage. No public education etc. So one extreme to the other.

Currently middle due to education, profession and earnings.

Working class. I was born in a working class family. I dont believe that you can change your class, but perhaps your children's.

I have a degree from a RG uni in a traditional subject and my earnings align with your posted definition of lower middle class. Despite coming from working class stock, my parents and grandparents took education seriously and had some non stereotypical 'working class' hobbies including classical music, opera, theatre and iterature and I was taken to concerts and performances as a child and played a musical instrument. In outlook, we were different to most other working class families we knew and I often felt like out of place. That totally changed at uni when I met lots of other working class people like me 😀

Using these criteria (which seem quite subjective), middle or upper middle - closer to the latter, however, I didn't go to private school by choice (I had a space and my parents were able to pay for it). Having said that, this is an interesting dynamic because I spent my earlier years in a different country and this often isn't seen in the same way here. FWIW, I think MN is quite diverse, but there are some people who pose as better educated, more knowledgeable or well-off than they actually are.

Hmm my back ground is working class and lower middle class but now I have what I consider a “luxury job” (music/music education, but not a class teacher). So I couldn’t claim to be those now. But I certainly don’t earn enough to be middle class and I don’t tend to enjoy the same activities as my middle class colleagues.

Oh no! Here i was thinking mners were tired of this classism "discussion" and would be telling the OP to jog on. But it clearly always is a conversation starter on here.

I find on mumsnet everyone wants to believe they are working class despite working in stereotypical middle class job in an office and having a masters degree or 2 and owning multiple properties just because their grandad was a bus driver or some nonsense.

90% of people on here are middle.

You definitions have me as MC in every aspect.
However I am WC.
(As per your definition of WC "...its about where you come from not what you now earn)

I'm here - waiting for the rugby to start - so...

I am NO class, I totally reject the class system. It is a horrible relic of a system that supports inequity of opportunity and creates systemic disadvantages for those on the lowest rungs of the ladder. Class prejudice is real, elitism is real and both cause individual and societal harm. I think it's shameful that it still exists today and frankly those who don't see a problem with it need to really do some soul-searching and honestly educate themselves. It's truly revolting.

I believe it’s just based on your job. Nothing to do with your parents job.
I’m a TA so I’m working class.

Where do the different classes put it? My mum kept ours in the sitting room (known as the lounge) Mine is on the kitchen table. DD doesn't have one and keeps her fruit in the fridge or cupboards. Have we experienced social mobility though the generations?

You can't say "don't come for me" about the descriptions when the whole premise of the thread is based on them, and they are pretty nonsensical.

Apart from anything else I think the household income must be taken from the US version of the same question just replaced with £.....according to the ONS the average household income in the UK is between £38k-41k depending on whether you take benefits into account, yet you have even the working class earning up to £60k!

Same with everyone from middle class up earning well over £100k, when stats show only 4% of the country take home that salary.

And how come is it only working class people who stay the same regardless of how much they earn? If class is about where you came from not how much you earn, doesn't that render the whole household income aspect irrelevant?

I work in a MC job in an office. I have a degree. My partner is trade and we've a white van parked outside. The minute either of us open our mouths, there's no mistaking us for MC.

I’m class … couldn’t give a fuck. Just wondered why MN is so obsessed with it? Can honestly say I’ve never once had a conversation with my friends to determine our class - because none of us care.

I have all the middle class signifiers but I work in a firmly snobby middle class sector when I’m regularly reminded through micro aggressions and the way some people treat me that I’m as common as muck and shit on their shoe.

Useless people get promoted above me all the time because they speak in RP and ‘know somebody’. So I’m with the oppressed working class for sure because I definitely don’t. Class prejudice is real.