Social Climbing

[Anonymous]

I am an immigrant and I have a dream. My dream is to ascend to the American upper middle to upper class. I was recently watching The Luckiest Girl in the World on Netflix and was intrigued by the machinations of the protagonist as she tries to escape her lower middle class roots. Truly though, how does one do this in real life?

I am not super pretty but I am thin. I am generally smart. I work at a local financial services company and live in Falls Church. I am married to my white American husband but he doesn't really bring much to the table in terms of my social climbing aspirations. He went to one of the local privates and an Ivy but he is a normal low key guy who prefers to go on hikes and play video games, lol. We do OK but not great, 300k
as of recently.

What can I do to raise my social status?

[Anonymous]

Honestly, it sounds like you have ascended to the upper middle class.

Now if you’re asking how you will get people to perceive you as being of a certain class of treating you a certain way, that’s a different thing. Depending on where you live, your community will never accept you as “one of them” for a million reasons, some as petty as not having grown up there, and some as nasty as being the wrong race or being unattractive.

It’s all arbitrary and the people you perceive as having high social standing only do because they’ve convinced you and others to see it that way and work hard to exclude others from that group.

My advice as someone who is probably perceived as being upper class/having high social status but who was raised by poor white people who were status-obsessed, and who married an immigrant of color whose family was obsessed with advancement: Don’t focus on income, Ivy League, etc. It’s a game that’s stacked against those in the outside.

Focus on what you *truly* care about and maximizing your children’s opportunities. And then when you feel like you’ve done that, turn to focusing on others and maximizing their opportunities.

[Anonymous]

$300k IS upper middle class.

[Anonymous]

Move out of falls church.

[Anonymous]

Get a new husband. Your neighbor is your soulmate

[Anonymous]

It usually takes generations of immigrants to ascend to the upper levels of income (class is something different). So instead of pining for fabulous wealth for myself, my husband and I have accumulated investments which will in time lay a solid foundation of wealth for our children. It will be up to them to build on that for theirs. I hope to teach my kids that it's not all about them - there is duty and privilege in building generational wealth and educating one's children to manage those expectations.

My family traces its direct ancestry to the early middle ages (we have diaries and various writings from or about ancestors starting from that time period). So I take the LONG view.

[Anonymous]

The video games are a problem. You are pretty much sunk. The sooner you realize this the better, and this is not a LOL kind of situation. Fairly bad situation for your kids, much less yourself. Your chess move is next.

[Anonymous]

I'm not following. $300K is considered UMC, as others have stated. Are you asking about how to raise your SES status or others perception of your income status?

If your DH is not onboard with this, you guys are going to be in for a bumpy marriage.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am an immigrant and I have a dream. My dream is to ascend to the American upper middle to upper class. I was recently watching The Luckiest Girl in the World on Netflix and was intrigued by the machinations of the protagonist as she tries to escape her lower middle class roots. Truly though, how does one do this in real life?

I am not super pretty but I am thin. I am generally smart. I work at a local financial services company and live in Falls Church. I am married to my white American husband but he doesn't really bring much to the table in terms of my social climbing aspirations. He went to one of the local privates and an Ivy but he is a normal low key guy who prefers to go on hikes and play video games, lol. We do OK but not great, 300k
as of recently.

What can I do to raise my social status?

Be a good and kind person - best long term strategy.

Do good

Use your advantages to help others through volunteer work/ faith community/ putting your skills to work to help others.

Mentor other immigrants

Invest in quality friends who are smart and kind - those friendships last

Have fun along the way

[Anonymous]

OP, based on what you shared, you appear to be in the professional class. There is a huge gap between the professional class and upper class (Old or New Money). Unless you develop a product or service that earns you millions of dollars and launches you into New Money, or you divorce your husband and get lucky in marrying into New Money (your status as an immigrant bars you from marrying into Old Money — that’s just the ugly truth), you will stay in the professional class. Rising between tiers becomes harder and harder the higher you go.

[Anonymous]

Why? As someone who comes from an upper class, old money family I don’t really understand why that is your goal. Most of the people in that world are boring or awful.

I run my family’s private foundation and give away millions of dollars a year to charitable causes. Doing the same, or finding a way to become connected with nonprofits is probably the best way to become enmeshed in this part of society. As I said not really sure why you’d want to, but that’s the “easiest” way. Start volunteering or join some committees and get involved in order to join.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
It usually takes generations of immigrants to ascend to the upper levels of income (class is something different). So instead of pining for fabulous wealth for myself, my husband and I have accumulated investments which will in time lay a solid foundation of wealth for our children. It will be up to them to build on that for theirs. I hope to teach my kids that it's not all about them - there is duty and privilege in building generational wealth and educating one's children to manage those expectations.

My family traces its direct ancestry to the early middle ages (we have diaries and various writings from or about ancestors starting from that time period). So I take the LONG view.

Every living person has ancestors from the Middle Ages. I do not understand.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why? As someone who comes from an upper class, old money family I don’t really understand why that is your goal. Most of the people in that world are boring or awful.

I run my family’s private foundation and give away millions of dollars a year to charitable causes. Doing the same, or finding a way to become connected with nonprofits is probably the best way to become enmeshed in this part of society. As I said not really sure why you’d want to, but that’s the “easiest” way. Start volunteering or join some committees and get involved in order to join.

A lot of younger social climbers have started doing that recently! Many of them are very blatant about it, though: they slap their names onto things without actually lifting a finger to help, whether it be raising funds or volunteering their time. And they always try to be where the cameras are at events to get the money shot of them standing next to some corporate big wig or featured celebrity guest. If OP can consistently do good work through her volunteering over several years, she can use that experience to keep doing the same for bigger and more well-funded nonprofits, but it is a significant investment in terms of time.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
It usually takes generations of immigrants to ascend to the upper levels of income (class is something different). So instead of pining for fabulous wealth for myself, my husband and I have accumulated investments which will in time lay a solid foundation of wealth for our children. It will be up to them to build on that for theirs. I hope to teach my kids that it's not all about them - there is duty and privilege in building generational wealth and educating one's children to manage those expectations.

My family traces its direct ancestry to the early middle ages (we have diaries and various writings from or about ancestors starting from that time period). So I take the LONG view.

[Anonymous]

OP are you white? Just curious. And how old are you?
My naive view is that the older and less white you are the harder it is. Divorce also lowers your chances, as well as the accent.
I must say I sometimes entertain thoughts about my cute teen getting into a fancy college and meeting a homely but rich girl and becoming rich as well, but that’s just some fantasy.