Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Income does not determine class status, net worth does. I know people who make considerably less money yet have higher net worths than some others with much higher incomes.
If you make $120K but are heavily in debt with a big mortgage, too big car payments and high credit card and/or student loan debts, and have a negative net worth, what does it matter what your income is?
Whatever number you want to pick. "Middle class" is a phantom term that means whatever the user wants it to. The really amazing thing that all readers also see it as meaning whatever they want it to. Everybody happy. Useful information transmitted, though, is often zero.
Income does not determine class status, net worth does. I know people who make considerably less money yet have higher net worths than some others with much higher incomes.
If you make $120K but are heavily in debt with a big mortgage, too big car payments and high credit card and/or student loan debts, and have a negative net worth, what does it matter what your income is?
Yeah I agree. I’ve had years I had no cash flow whatsoever. Zero income. Many years / most years I report a loss for federal income tax purposes. Then every once in a while I pay a few hundred thousand in taxes in the same year lol. My net worth is generally increasing much more than any cash flow I’m seeing, because most of my money is invested.
Income does not determine class status, net worth does. I know people who make considerably less money yet have higher net worths than some others with much higher incomes.
If you make $120K but are heavily in debt with a big mortgage, too big car payments and high credit card and/or student loan debts, and have a negative net worth, what does it matter what your income is?
middle class and middle class lifestyle can mean two very different things .
the new york times looked in to that same question ..there is no answer .
"There is no single, formal definition of class status in this country.
Statisticians and demographers all use slightly different methods to divvy up the great American whole
into quintiles and median ranges. Complicating things, most people like to think of themselves as middle
class. It feels good, after all, and more egalitarian than proclaiming yourself to be rich or poor. A $70,000
annual income is middle class for a family of four, according to the median response in a recent Pew
Research Center survey, and yet people at a wide range of income levels, including those making less than $30,000 and more than $100,000 a year, said they, too, belonged to the middle.
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. The least expensive properties are mostly uptown, in neighborhoods like Yorkville, Washington Heights and Inwood. The most pleasing 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 $68,700 or less qualifies to apply for the New York City Housing Authority’s public housing."
Status:
"TRUMP 2024 or CIVIL WAR!"
(set 21 hours ago)
Location: Florida
10,638 posts, read 4,144,055 times
Reputation: 8656
Quote:
Originally Posted by kgpremed13
I'm thinking 120k, well for the southeast at least. Also, upper middle class people usually have at least a bachelor's degree.
You would be surprised how many high incomes don't have a bachelor's degree involved. Maybe 10 years ago, having a bachelor's degree was all the rage, but then companies hiring would realize these kids pretty much wasted 4 years of their prime lives on useless theories instead of actual knowledge. Now many companies are offering hiring right out of highschool to teach them the ropes vs the college students. The company I work for had to work with the local college communities with the machinist programs because the students coming out of those colleges didn't know how to do anything!
Anyways, like others said, class isn't just income alone. I make a good deal of money thanks to my real estate investments, but the sad fact is, as much as I love horses and am good with them, I have never been welcomed with the Palm Beach Polo Club socialites, even though I bring in more income and have more land than half of them. They come from "old money", and will look down on you if you can't trace your lineage to some great aristocrat from a thousand years ago.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
