Are you really Middle Class?

Because Australia doesn't have a class system like the UK perhaps Middle Income is a more meaningful description. This article was in today's paper:

The overwhelming majority of the survey's respondents, some 92 per cent, thought they sat in the middle 60 per cent of households ranked by income - a statistical near-impossibility, as the survey ranged across all income groups. In reality, around a third of those surveyed had misjudged how far above or below the centre they really were.

As the article said it makes a rod for politicians backs when they talk about cutting middle class welfare because everybody gets nervous. It is also interesting to hear a union leader describe his members as in the middle to high income bracket.

Is it the same picture in the UK and Europe these days?

This is a snapshot of today's earnings compared with the last half century or so. (divide the $ figures by half to get them in Pounds £)


People are certainly much better off than ever.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

I'm not speaking from statistics here , just from my impression but I think it's fair to say that, apart from the current economic blip, most people are better off than they have ever been.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

I understand what you are saying, Alan. To take that one step further, yes while we are better off than we have ever been, that has peaked.

Our standards are beginning to decline and will do so for a fair few years to come. What this Government is doing is devaluing the wage of the workforce without devaluing the currency of the nation, in the hope that by working for less we will become more competitive, in much the same way Germany is doing.

We have experienced peaks and troughs in parts of our economy, the housing market, the holiday boom and the like - now we are going to see a trough in the national economy.

Rather than devalue the pound to keep us moving forward and maintaining our wealth, we are going to be made to cut our cloth to the material we've got, and it's going to hurt.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

I think things have blurred over the years I am working class from a working class family, office cleaner from a welder and farm worker family but I live far closer to a middle class lifestyle, nice flat, enjoy classical music, holidays, car etc than I do working class (apologies for this I hate the word but cannot think of another) chav like culture. If they had never classed that group of people as working class I would say I am working class but I have nothing at all in common with them.

We always had a lower working class which is I guess what the chav culture has taken over from but back then they were called common and we had an upper working class who had standards.

I know it's usual these days to say class is bad but it's hard to designate by money as many lower working class people have far more money than us upper working class people due to the benefit system.

All just my opinion and sorry if it offends anyone.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

I think I know what you mean Julie but I still call myself working class as that's what I've been all my life but we do have all the mod cons etc as we've worked hard for what we have ,I don't know what's meant by middle class these days, it used to be that you weren't 'rich' but owned or were paying off your home, my parents had council housing and here I live in government housing and manage well on the pension, what's a chav? is it a gypsy, or just someone who won't work?

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

Chav is explained quite well here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chav


We are in social housing too but having a shared ownership flat we are paying rent to the council and mortgage, with a service charge to pay for communal areas. You can see why the classes are blurring from that - we own and rent at the same time lol

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

In the olden days the upper class were curtseyed to I cant see that happening nowadays. I am from a very poor family and lived with no inside
bathroom and toilet until I was 16. I went to work when I was 15yrs old. We didnt go on holidays and I had to save up my small wage in an office for about a year to go on my first holiday abroad when I was 19.
What did happen and I am sure its the same for many was we dragged ourselves out of that poor living. Bearing in mind that non of the 4 children in our house left with any qualifications. My eldest Brother learnt how to fly planes and had horses of his own on a small holding from training to be a Plumber. My next Brother went to night school and is or was before he retired a Electrical Engineer with a great pension from working since he was 15. My sister went to college aged 28 and is a fab cook and worked later on with Outreach work for drug addicts and helped hundreds of people. I could always talk so I became a GPO telephonist and then a great Telemarketer. We have holidays abroad and own our houses and cars. My kids went to University and so did my neices and nephews. So, the point I am trying to make was if you work hard and think above the station the World seems to put us in with Class, then you can achieve a higher Class spurred on with the poverty you had as a child. You have to think out of the box.
Now we are all pensioners, I agree that the money is eroding for everyone but its been allowed for decades now that people work hard and pay taxes and then you have the others who think we owe them a living. Hopefully things will change.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and in the cotext of this thread, we in the west seem to have an ever increasing standard of living, but it stands to sense that someone else on this planet is paying the price for this, so, enjoy, but spare the occasional thought for those who inevitably paying the price.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

It's my belief that this is cyclical. We can't just keep getting wealthier ad infinitum. The crash has arrived and we will step back for a decade or so and start over again.

Re: Are you really Middle Class?

Bruce matey, yes those statistics are very interesting, BUT they tell only half the story. What needs to be added to get a true picture is the COST of living and the rate of inflation through those years. Whilst it would appear that incomes have increased markedly (as they have) so too have costs, therefore whilst it would seem that we are all better off financially, when one looks at the cost of living and compares that, it may show that we were better off than we are now.