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Old 03-21-2018, 01:45 AM
 
Location: Wasilla, AK
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Do you make the cut? This article defines upper class according to family size and income. I make the cut, but sometimes I sure don't feel like I do.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/20/how-...per-class.html
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Old 03-21-2018, 03:01 AM
 
Location: Honolulu, HI
24,161 posts, read 9,104,642 times
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The article didn’t take into account of where you live, $100K doesn’t go far in San Francisco nor would it be considered upper class.

Plus it’s not how much you make, it’s how much you keep. Some folks are living beyond their means and that money goes as fast as it comes (see broke professional athletes).
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Old 03-21-2018, 03:03 AM
 
105,688 posts, read 107,663,235 times
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69k in nyc or the boroughs still qualifies you for a nyc housing project .

determining where income falls out and in which cohort is very different than living that lifestyle .

as an example a middle class lifestyle vs middle class income can have nothing in common .

as pointed out by the ny times :

By one measure, in cities like Houston or Phoenix — places considered by statisticians to be more typical of average United States incomes than New York — a solidly middle-class life can be had for wages that fall between $33,000 and $100,000 a year.

By the same formula — measuring by who sits in the middle of the income spectrum — Manhattan’s middle class exists somewhere between $45,000 and $134,000.

But if you are defining middle class by lifestyle, to accommodate the cost of living in Manhattan, that salary would have to fall between $80,000 and $235,000. This means someone making $70,000 a year in other parts of the country would need to make $166,000 in Manhattan to enjoy the same purchasing power.

Using the rule of thumb that buyers should expect to spend two and a half times their annual salary on a home purchase, the properties in Manhattan that could be said to be middle class would run between $200,000 and $588,000.

On the low end, the pickings are slim. most options in this range, however, are one-bedroom apartments not designed for children or families.

It is not surprising, then, that a family of four with an annual income of 69k or less qualifies to apply for the New York City Housing Authority’s public housing.

Last edited by mathjak107; 03-21-2018 at 03:41 AM..
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Old 03-21-2018, 06:34 AM
 
Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Here $72,000 qualifies as low income, with median household income at over $160k, so their chart is not applicable. You cannot generalize for the whole USA, it varies greatly by the location. The lower end of the chart considered upper class is barely middle class here, and $102,000 income would not be enough to buy a home, or even a condo.
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Old 03-21-2018, 07:28 AM
 
Location: TN/NC
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I'm pretty close to that $72,000 benchmark. I live in a fairly low cost area of Tennessee. I'm single.

$72,000 here is a good income, but it is not upper class.
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Old 03-21-2018, 07:30 AM
 
11,230 posts, read 9,158,492 times
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Well, the article fails, as does the title of this thread, to distinguish between "upper income" and "upper class"; plus there is no discussion of how the threshold of "double the median income" was arrived at.

To me, "upper income" means one could stop working now and never feel it.

To me, "upper class" is a whole suite of behaviors and attitudes that are generally correlated with income but are not driven by it. A retired professional boxer who grew up in the ghetto and now earns many millions of dollars per year from his investments of the money he earned while boxing, is not upper class; though his grandchildren might be.
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Old 03-21-2018, 09:21 AM
 
Location: NY/LA
4,645 posts, read 4,503,121 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by turf3 View Post
Well, the article fails, as does the title of this thread, to distinguish between "upper income" and "upper class"; plus there is no discussion of how the threshold of "double the median income" was arrived at.

To me, "upper income" means one could stop working now and never feel it.

To me, "upper class" is a whole suite of behaviors and attitudes that are generally correlated with income but are not driven by it. A retired professional boxer who grew up in the ghetto and now earns many millions of dollars per year from his investments of the money he earned while boxing, is not upper class; though his grandchildren might be.
I agree. There is a huge difference between "upper income" and "upper class". These numbers are much closer to "upper middle class" than they are to "upper class".
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Old 03-21-2018, 09:43 AM
 
466 posts, read 421,828 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mathjak107 View Post
69k in nyc or the boroughs still qualifies you for a nyc housing project .

determining where income falls out and in which cohort is very different than living that lifestyle .

as an example a middle class lifestyle vs middle class income can have nothing in common .

as pointed out by the ny times :

By one measure, in cities like Houston or Phoenix — places considered by statisticians to be more typical of average United States incomes than New York — a solidly middle-class life can be had for wages that fall between $33,000 and $100,000 a year.

By the same formula — measuring by who sits in the middle of the income spectrum — Manhattan’s middle class exists somewhere between $45,000 and $134,000.

But if you are defining middle class by lifestyle, to accommodate the cost of living in Manhattan, that salary would have to fall between $80,000 and $235,000. This means someone making $70,000 a year in other parts of the country would need to make $166,000 in Manhattan to enjoy the same purchasing power.

Using the rule of thumb that buyers should expect to spend two and a half times their annual salary on a home purchase, the properties in Manhattan that could be said to be middle class would run between $200,000 and $588,000.

On the low end, the pickings are slim. most options in this range, however, are one-bedroom apartments not designed for children or families.

It is not surprising, then, that a family of four with an annual income of 69k or less qualifies to apply for the New York City Housing Authority’s public housing.
100% accurate post. I think most people have no clue how to identify their incomes in relation to others because they stay in a "bubble". If most of their peers are in the same income range, they think they're middle class. If they are above their peers, they think they're better off. If they make less, then they feel poorer.

I think it also explains how lifestyle creeps happens and removes the qualifiers for social strata
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Old 03-21-2018, 09:54 AM
 
4,690 posts, read 10,340,666 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by mathjak107 View Post

Using the rule of thumb that buyers should expect to spend two and a half times their annual salary on a home purchase, the properties in Manhattan that could be said to be middle class would run between $200,000 and $588,000.

I hadn't heard this before (on my 4th home now). First home in Wyoming was 1.5 times, second in Denver was about 2 times (both of these were just under $1k/month for mortgage, insurance and taxes). Both in Georgia have been under 1 (roughly .75), and under $500/month in costs. All homes were 3 bed/2 bath and around 2,000sq/ft (2 "starter", 2 custom built).


Would that indicate "high income" class then? I think our highest tax year ever was $92k, we're a bit south of that now though....

Such a hard thing to pigeon hole when there are Such variations across this country.
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Old 03-21-2018, 10:01 AM
 
Location: Colorado
3,991 posts, read 2,667,696 times
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Given the cost of housing here in Denver, I don't know that 72K a year would put one at 'upper' income.....
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