Isn’t middle simply confusing?
Are we not working folks and wealthy-ruling folks that generate wealth via assets?
Edit: thank you all who’ve helped me gain a better understand of the concept from many different angles
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Working class > Middle class > Upper class. At least in a traditional western model. Middle class used to mean people who were in charge of some people, whilst continuing to be ruled over by the upper class.
Because the lower class (the one below middle-class) also works. So if you say Working Class, you are talking about a system that divides people into roughly two groups, upper/ruling class and working class. If you say “Middle Class” the you aren’t just talking about the whole working class, you’re referring to a specific sub-section of the working class. Middle class doesn’t just mean working. It means “working, but can comfortably afford food and housing and probably some hobbies and some limited travel”. If you just said “working class” that means a different thing and it includes a bunch more lower-income / poorer people.
People tend to use “upper class” and the opposite of upper is “lower”. One simply doesn’t say “upper class vs the poor” cause you always try to say within the same vocabulary family. Since people use upper and lower class, that leaves the one in between, which would be middle class.
Again, it would be confusing if you say “the upper class doesn’t work, the ones that do all the grunt work is the lower class and the working class”. It makes it arbitrary and confusing. Whereas if you replace working with middle, everyone gets the picture of upper, middle, and lower class.
no one likes to feel poor. were all wage slaves. I think middle class these days actually refers to people with net worth of $1m plus, own their own home, have some supplemental income from investments, could take a 3 year hiatus from work no problem. But dont quite have enough money to really invest in capital and become a full on capitalist pulling in $1m+ a year in capital gains
“Middle class” originally referred to the people who didn’t have generational wealth, titles, etc. but whom worked professions or owned businesses that provided them enough money to move in the circles of those who did. They were new money that had enough to send their kids to good schools, buy fine clothes, etc. but not enough to be the idle rich like so many of the upper class, and at the end of the day they still had to work to maintain it.
Without the more defined social hierarchy of Europe to reinforce class awareness, American politicians in the 20th century convinced voters that they were not, in fact, the lower “working” class, but a new “middle” class all benefitting from the wealth of their great nation generated through personal responsibility and a bunch of other malarky. The “working” class became more commonly referred to as the “lower” class to give those people someone to look down on and fear would come to take what was rightfully theirs.
“Working class” has the connotation of manual labor, trades (plumbing, carpentry, etc.), or other blue-collar work.
“Middle class” has the connotation of white-collar work: office work or managerial positions that don’t involve manual labor and require a college degree.
The between middle class and upper class is also a bit fuzzy. You’ll see people being described as “middle-upper class” or “working rich” (contrasted with the “idle rich”), where they’re still very wealthy but don’t have any generational wealth and still work full-time.
What is confusing about it? There’s a lower class (mostly made up of blue collar low-wage workers), middle class (good blue collar jobs, white collar professionals, small business owners) and upper class (family wealth, business executives, highly paid professionals etc.)
Exactly how the classes are defined can also depend a bit in where in the world you are. I get the impression that in the States it largely goes by your own wealth/economic power and it’s more a measure of how personally successful you’ve been?
Here in the UK it’s much more based on traditional class roles, and your class is largely set by your family and upbringing rather than your own life path.
Upper class is the aristocracy. They’ve got noble titles in the family, own a country estate going back hundreds of years, don’t really work etc. They’re often asset rich but cash poor – those big country houses are really valuable but it’s unthinkable to sell them and they cost a fortune to run and maintain. Meanwhile it’s unseemly to work, and their traditional income streams from the people working on their land have fallen away. Their family all go to private schools and talk posh. You can’t get into the upper class just by being rich – it’s all about the blue blood.
The middle class is the top rung for the ‘normies’. Their family typically have prestigious careers that would be termed ‘professionals’ (doctors, lawyers, academics, engineers, managers, bankers etc) and usually have university education. This typically means being raised in a stable household with a comfortable lifestyle, but it’s quite possible to be a traditionally middle class person and be down on your luck. Might be expected to have more high-brow interests.
The working class is the majority. Going back to the middle ages, these would be the peasants. From families of blue collar and unskilled workers with limited education, traditionally the poorest part of society. Often expected to have ‘cruder’ interests (e.g. going to the football rather than the theatre). Some can stereotypically mistrust formal education as a sort of betrayal of your class.
There’s a lot more social mobility between the working and middle classes nowadays, particularly with the push in recent decades to get more young people going to university. Though you still hear plenty of tales even now of people from traditionally working class families who are “the first person in my family to go to uni”. But your class doesn’t just change because you got a degree – you could have somebody with a good degree and a professional career – but they grew up on a council estate with working class parents, they’re probably still going to identify with (and be shaped by) those origins.
They are not the same. Based on the definitions below – which are just found on the interwebz – it doesn’t make sense to discuss “working class” unless you are specifically talking about their working conditions. You can be dirt poor and still be working class, while you wouldn’t be middle class. I suppose you can also be pretty rich and be a part of the working class, going by the definition below.
Working class: the social group consisting primarily of people who are employed in unskilled or semi-skilled manual or industrial work.
Middle class: The middle class refers to a class of people in the middle of a social hierarchy, often defined by occupation, income, education, or social status.
It should be noted that in Europe, and in particular Britain, class has nothing to do with how much money you have.
Upper-class people can be destitute, and lower-class people can be millionaires.
It’s about who your parents and grandparents are and what your upbringing was like.
The Middle Class developed from the medieval professionals (lawyers, teachers, doctors) and merchants. Families who were neither landowners nor farmers/labourers.
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