Can we stop referring to households making $200 or 300K a year as "middle class"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Serious question: Why do you insist you are middle class when you know you are not? I thought you worked hard for what you have, so why deny it? It's like having a PhD but only admitting to a high school. It makes no sense.

Are you ashamed of your wealth?

Spoken like someone without firsthand knowledge.

No, I have a net worth ove $1.5M and HHI over $200K. I know I'm not middle class. You?

NP here. So if you lose your job (or jobs if spouse contributes some to that income) are you suddenly lower class? Class isn't all about money. It's about choices that you make -- it's about how educated you are and how much you value education for your kids, it's about what you do with your leisure time and whether you have autonomy at work.

For me, we have a HHI of about $95k, which some of you think makes us "poor". We also have a networth that's close to $1.5 million. We live in DC. We take vacations overseas. We send our kids to struggling public schools. We buy clothes at thrift stores (and donate frequently too). Where does that put my household? Are we just lower class?

[Anonymous]

2 baths is not a must, 3 beds is. So one entire quadrant of the city is only for wealthy people? Seems pretty outrageous to me. At 250k/yr, an extra 500-800 per month for one extra bedroom in an apartment shouldn't be that big of a deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

I keep saying that people are deceived by the fact that several hundred thousand households in this area make over $200K and that makes them think that this makes it middle class. There are over a million households that make signficantly less than $200K. Yes there are many more families making over $200K than there used to be, but that's because the region's population is significantly higher than it used to be. Many of those million households also have student loans (there are many people who went to state schools at in-state rates that still have student loans to pay). Additionally, people are measuring the middle class based on some outdated models from when we were growing up. The truth is that the lower classes from middle class down have less buying power than their peers and parents did from earlier generations. The middle class is getting poorer, not wealthier. Despite the whining from the upper classes, the policies of the last 30+ years have redistributed the wealth so that the upper classes have much more of the nation's wealth than they used to.

Well said. And people who are earning more, but getting less for their money are just deceiving themselves. Basically it now takes two incomes working more than 40 hours each to make what our parents made with one parent working.

I think this is the heart of the problem. Everyone from lower to upper middle class is getting less for their money. Only the truly wealthy are doing better than previous generations. The quibble over how to define middle vs upper middle misses the point. The point is that people who are comparing their childhood to how they live now are realizing that in general it is harder for all classes to replicate the lifestyle they grew up with. Which is disheartening because each generation is supposed to continue to do better than the last. I was the first in my family to graduate college (and then attend grad school) and feel the upper middle class lifestyle my parents were able to provide on one income is harder to attain than it was back in the 80s/90s.

A family of 4 can qualify for affordable housing slots on 80k/year around here. To me, you are lower middle class if you are qualifying for affordable housing. It doesn't matter whether 150k or 250k is the exact mark of middle vs upper middle. The problem is that climbing the SES ladder is much more difficult than it used to be and our middle class as a whole is not doing as well as it used to be.

Where?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:2 baths is not a must, 3 beds is. So one entire quadrant of the city is only for wealthy people? Seems pretty outrageous to me. At 250k/yr, an extra 500-800 per month for one extra bedroom in an apartment shouldn't be that big of a deal.

Yep NW is pretty much out of reach for those of us who are really middle class. Our HHI is 90k and we can't even consider NW.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:my HHI is about $500K. I consider myself on the upper end of middle class, but certainly nowhere close to upper class. I drive 10+ year old cars, agonize over repair bills, give my wife a hard time for ordering a $6.00 home video rental tonight, etc.

I seriously pity you. Your extreme frugality is pathetic.

eh, I live paycheck to paycheck because I have a 15 year mortgage and I invest in a lot of conservative real estate deals. Sorry I don't blow money on depreciating assets.

You're a sad person. Truly.

Why? PP clearly has networth, just manages income very strictly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do we talk about vacationing in Europe as a big deal because of the cost? Can't we just say "we spend a lot on vacations' rather than calling out Europe as if it separates us?


We take multiple vacations a year but I have no desire to vacation in Europe. If I spend as much as the European vacation crowd, am I still in this elite club? I sure hope so.

As a European, I agree. It doesn't sound impressive to me, and we do vacation in Europe every year or every other year on a sub 100k HHI.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:2 baths is not a must, 3 beds is. So one entire quadrant of the city is only for wealthy people? Seems pretty outrageous to me. At 250k/yr, an extra 500-800 per month for one extra bedroom in an apartment shouldn't be that big of a deal.

Yep NW is pretty much out of reach for those of us who are really middle class. Our HHI is 90k and we can't even consider NW.

There are plenty of people with that HHI living in NW. I know because I am one of them.

[Anonymous]

that explains why there's no good ethnic food in the NW

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:2 baths is not a must, 3 beds is. So one entire quadrant of the city is only for wealthy people? Seems pretty outrageous to me. At 250k/yr, an extra 500-800 per month for one extra bedroom in an apartment shouldn't be that big of a deal.

Much of NW is off limits to you, but there are definitely areas like Petworth, Brightwood and Takoma where you can find something more affordable.

Here's a 3 BR house, for $800 less than you are currently paying:

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/apa/4853204506.html

Here's 3 BR in Brightwood that would save you $850

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/doc/apa/4841815925.html

This is Takoma Park MD, right over the line and you'd save more than $1,000.

http://washingtondc.craigslist.org/mld/apa/4860490566.html

If you want to save more, you can get 3 Bedrooms here and save $1,500 walking distance from NW, and a quick bus ride to the Red Line and the amenities of Downtown Silver Spring

http://rollingwoodmd.riverstoneres.com/Apartments/module/property_info/property%5Bid%5D/105400/

$1,500 a month is 18K a year towards paying down those student loans, or saving up for a down payment.

Or you can just say "I know I'm upper middle class. I can afford some luxuries but not ALL the luxuries. The luxuries I choose are to live in a wealthy area, to not have the baby sleep in my room, to have my own office . . . " I'm good with that choice.

[Anonymous]

The problem is whenever we start talking about the "rich", people start saying "hey, look over there at the guy who makes twice as much as I do."

"Middle class" has a positive connotation, virtuous, hard-working, community-minded, deserving, etc. So everyone wants to identify with it whether they're making $50,000 a year or $300,000 a year.

"Rich" in contrast implies evokes images of Ebeneezer Scrooge or Paris Hilton.

So - we're all middle class - the clerk at Sears is and so is the doctor and the lawyer.

Maybe we should just say people with high incomes. When it's framed as a question of income distribution rather than state of mind", the $300,000 a year earner isn't in the "middle" of anything.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:2 baths is not a must, 3 beds is. So one entire quadrant of the city is only for wealthy people? Seems pretty outrageous to me. At 250k/yr, an extra 500-800 per month for one extra bedroom in an apartment shouldn't be that big of a deal.

Yep NW is pretty much out of reach for those of us who are really middle class. Our HHI is 90k and we can't even consider NW.

There are plenty of people with that HHI living in NW. I know because I am one of them.

Although presumably you aren't paying $3300 in rent like PP who claims to be middle class

[Anonymous]

In answer to the question, no.

[Anonymous]

FYI, from the New York Times today: "Middle Class Shrinks Further as More Fall Out Instead of Climbing Up"
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/26/business/economy/middle-class-shrinks-further-as-more-fall-out-instead-of-climbing-up.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=photo-spot-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Definition of "middle class" from the article:

“I would consider middle class to be people who can live comfortably on what they earn, can pay their bills, can set aside something to save for retirement and for kids in college and can have vacations and entertainment,” said Christine L. Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project, a left-leaning research and advocacy group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:FYI, from the New York Times today: "Middle Class Shrinks Further as More Fall Out Instead of Climbing Up"
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/26/business/economy/middle-class-shrinks-further-as-more-fall-out-instead-of-climbing-up.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=photo-spot-region®ion=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

Definition of "middle class" from the article:

“I would consider middle class to be people who can live comfortably on what they earn, can pay their bills, can set aside something to save for retirement and for kids in college and can have vacations and entertainment,” said Christine L. Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project, a left-leaning research and advocacy group.

Way to mislead. You picked a select quote that suggests that higher income folks qualify. But earlier in the article they are much more explicit:

In the late 1960s, more than half of the households in the United States were squarely in the middle, earning, in today’s dollars, $35,000 to $100,000 a year.

Still, regardless of their income, most Americans identify as middle class. The term itself is so amorphous that politicians often cite the group in introducing proposals to engender wide appeal.

The definition here starts at $35,000 — which is about 50 percent higher than the official poverty level for a family of four — and ends at the six-figure mark. Although many Americans in households making more than $100,000 consider themselves middle class, particularly those living in expensive regions like the Northeast and Pacific Coast, they have substantially more money than most people.

Even as the American middle class has shrunk, it has gone through a transformation. The 53 million households that remain in the middle class — about 43 percent of all households — look considerably different from their middle-class predecessors of a previous generation, according to a New York Times analysis of census data.

So there are 53M households, approximately 43% that fall between $35K and $100K. Even adjusting for the higher regional COL, we're still talking roughly $50K-150K of HHI. Nowhere near $200K or $300K

[Anonymous]

To the PP asking about my cite re: affordable housing. The answer is Fairfax County.

http://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/rha/rentalhousingprograms/fcrp.htm

Check out the second column. A household of 4 with an income of $85,850 is considered to be earning 80% of the area's median income and qualifies for affordable rental units.

I think this is the problem with trying to put a dollar number on middle class. A single person making 85k is much better off than a family of 4 living off 85k. To me, the idea of middle class is being able to afford at least a 3 bedroom SFH in a decent school district with a less than 30-45 min commute. The ability to save for college, take a vacation every other year or so, have some savings, go out to eat for special occasions, etc. The problem is that the "middle class lifestyle" no longer matches up with the actual "middle class income." Watch the documentary "Inequality for All." Very eye opening.