The Middle Class Is Hurting,But Who's Middle Class? (high school, compared, financial)

[residinghere2007]

Originally Posted by gladhands

Will have a serious misconception about what the middle class was in the 60s. 60s middle class isn’t that difficult to achieve. Raise your family of four in a two bedroom bungalow without central air. Don’t get cable, Internet or cell phones. You don’t have to live in a great school district because you don’t really expect your kids to go to college. Buy your kids two pairs of pants and one pair of shoes for the year. Have one car.

, 60s working class is modern day working poor, and it’s quite achievable.

I also agree with this.

I make a very good income and honestly still live a majority of the 60s way lol. I have a house that is paid for (it is 4bd though but is an old house so not very large), I send my kids to public schools (though I do expect them to go to college), I don't buy a lot of pants/shoes/shirts/etc. and we have cars that are paid for with cash. I don't have cable, but do have internet and a cell phone - honestly you cannot put your kids through school today without the internet otherwise it will be a burden. Nearly everything they do and all communication with school is done online.

As a person who would be considered "skilled" and I am income-wise in the middle class, I honestly am not "hurting" which is why I assume those who are probably mostly include the unskilled laborers primarily. I don't hurt because I don't spend a lot of money. I also did grow up in poverty and so think that me living in a paid for house in the inner city, is me being "rich" lol. I actually have "extra" money, something I never had when I was young and poor.

[Toyman at Jewel Lake]

Originally Posted by gladhands

Will have a serious misconception about what the middle class was in the 60s. 60s middle class isn’t that difficult to achieve. Raise your family of four in a two bedroom bungalow without central air. Don’t get cable, Internet or cell phones. You don’t have to live in a great school district because you don’t really expect your kids to go to college. Buy your kids two pairs of pants and one pair of shoes for the year. Have one car.

, 60s working class is modern day working poor, and it’s quite achievable.

AGREED. In the 60s and 70s, well paid blue collar workers had a small (by today's standards, 1000-1400ish SF) house with 2 or 3 bedrooms to raise a family of 4. 1 bathroom, 1 TV, 1 phone that hung from a wall and typically 1 car. Teenagers didn't get nearly new cars (let alone cloths or phones) bought for them-they got jobs and paid for their own things, and actually rode bicycles to school much of their teen years. Our expectations have changed over the last 4 or 5 decades.

[evilcart]

Originally Posted by Pandamonium

Actually, middle class had three different classes, lower, middle and upper. And it used to be posted that to even hit lower middle class was making 100,000 and up and this was probably 15 years ago. It wasn't that long ago. And I got that information from a government site. In fact, I think I got it from the WH site.

I remember this because I had to do something for school and I had an argument with my father.Not so much an argument, but he said to back it up and I did. And I made him look this up and his salary put him into right above what used to be called upper working class. Barely. His response was, I have done all of this and I am not even considered middle class.

To me, that was very telling. Primarily because that it isn't necessary for the actual dollar amount ......but the perception.

The baseline is there. The people that are doing the bitchin' are more than likely, by that 15 year old baseline, mid-upper working class. But, hey you can throw a beans and wiener sob story out there if you need to.

your numbers are wrong. There is no group i am aware that claims lower middle class requires an income of 100k plus. Sure you could argue that if you live in a rich location with extremely high incomes, 100k might come in as lower income in that tiny area, but that is not how we define it.

sure you might find some professor somewhere who decides to use big numbers to get some attention, but that does not change reality.

in reality a household income over 100k puts you in upper middle class in much of the nation.

there are calculators that will tell you where your income fits based on region, size of household , net worth and education.

but if we are just talking income your numbers just wrong.

[scarabchuck]

Originally Posted by skycaller23

Tech jobs. Corporations cried there was not enough American college graduates to fill the job positions.
It was back office tech at first.

I saw it in automotive product design for the first time in 2001, now looking back I saw it in die design in '98...hence the reason I jumped in to the product end instead of the tooling. And from design it went to engineering and now styling.
Oddly enough, there were hardly any degreed designers back then. And there were a high number of engineers doing the job without a degree.
Here and now, if one wanted to do my job they would need a mechanical engineering degree to get into the field.

[tamajane]

Originally Posted by Toyman at Jewel Lake

AGREED. In the 60s and 70s, well paid blue collar workers had a small (by today's standards, 1000-1400ish SF) house with 2 or 3 bedrooms to raise a family of 4. 1 bathroom, 1 TV, 1 phone that hung from a wall and typically 1 car. Teenagers didn't get nearly new cars (let alone cloths or phones) bought for them-they got jobs and paid for their own things, and actually rode bicycles to school much of their teen years. Our expectations have changed over the last 4 or 5 decades.

The working/middle class I grew up with 70s had two cars, two tvs, two phones, a rec room/extra bedroom in the basement, and we might get mom's old car, or parents would gift us some money toward a car, not buy outright. Kids had after school jobs which is good for them anyway.

Some of us had an inground pool, mostly one level homes but finished basement adds a lot of area. The kids that lived in the bungalows by the river were "poor" - that meant there was no dad or dad could not hold a steady job. Any two parent home with a full time functional working dad could do fine - blue collar, white collar, small business owners - all living together in nice little communities, able to work and live and pay their bills.

[Hoonose]

Originally Posted by gladhands

Ward Cleaver was a commercial banker who went to work in a suit and had a secretary. He was upper-middle class.

Definitely. I watched Beaver when I was his age. We were lower middle class.

[Hoonose]

Originally Posted by Toyman at Jewel Lake

AGREED. In the 60s and 70s, well paid blue collar workers had a small (by today's standards, 1000-1400ish SF) house with 2 or 3 bedrooms to raise a family of 4. 1 bathroom, 1 TV, 1 phone that hung from a wall and typically 1 car. Teenagers didn't get nearly new cars (let alone cloths or phones) bought for them-they got jobs and paid for their own things, and actually rode bicycles to school much of their teen years. Our expectations have changed over the last 4 or 5 decades.

Our standard of living is higher. And that should be the main point. Among other things it takes into account new technologies, including health related and inflation.

[Tall Traveler]

It seems to me that the level of affluence is much higher now than when I was younger. I was just went back to watch Texas A&M versus Alabama football game and was struck how affluent the students at TAMU seemed now compared to when I was young. When I was young and in college, I had no money for anything. My kids have so much more than we had growing up.

anyway, middle class to me is generally $50K (w/o kids and in a lower cost area) up to $200K (in a lower cost area) or up to $300K in the most expensive areas.

[Mighty_Pelican]

People from a working class background box up leftovers at restaurants for consumption the day after. Middle class folk don't.

[tamajane]

Originally Posted by Mighty_Pelican

People from a working class background box up leftovers at restaurants for consumption the day after. Middle class folk don't.

LOL.

I usually eat about half, should I believe the server has assessed my economic level if she asks me if I want to take it home?