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

[Anonymous]

That's the Democrat for you: take from the "rich" and give to the upper middle class. There's no real progressive or labor party in this country, and it's not surprising a lot of working class folk vote for Republican based on social issues rather than these limousine liberals that pass as the US "left."

[Anonymous]

Are the schools in Silver Spring really that bad? Is SS lower than middle class economically? Seems pretty middle to upper middle for the most part to me, and seems more "middle class" than CC/Bethesda to me.

[Anonymous]

ok done. I will call them "muddle class". Happy?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the choice argument only works if these families could move to lower cost of living areas and still make that much. That usually isn't the case.

This.

I feel so sorry for those people who have no choice but to live in Chevy Chase or Great Falls. Must be tough.

It is. We bought a Chevy Chase home from family at a price what we would have paid in Damascus 15 years ago. They wanted the house to stay in the family and DH had just taken a job in a downtown nonprofit. That job is not transferrable to another place and we depend on Metro access to his work. We are the have-nots in the land of haves. Not all of us wanted to be exactly here, but life and jobs put us here.

Life is all about choices. I learned a long time ago what my biggest priority was. You accepted what at the time you though was a good choice. Now looking back you would maybe not have made the same choice.

You are here now so forget about the past. Where do you want to live in two years? You can work at being somewhere else if you really wanted to leave.

[Anonymous]

Are we talking 200-300k net home income? Or before deductions?

[Anonymous]

200k and can't afford a house I'd actually want to live in. I consider us solidly middle class.

[Anonymous]

Reality check. http://money.cnn.com/interactive/economy/are-you-middle-class/?sr=fbmoney012015areyoumiddleclass0930interactive

In DC the middle income bracket is $49,703-$85,719. This is one of the highest in the country, but it's nowhere NEAR $200k.

And yes, some if us are even on DCUM

[Anonymous]

Doesn't the majority of the population of Montgomery County have a "Silver Spring" mailing address and not live in Chevy Chase or the swanky parts of Bethesda? Yet we're supposed to think someone in CC with a $200-300K HH income is "middle class" and struggling to get by? OK then...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:200k and can't afford a house I'd actually want to live in. I consider us solidly middle class.

I'd consider you to have expensive taste.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Well, it's based on Cost of Living where YOU live. In the close in neighborhoods in DC, NOVA and MOCo, that income puts a family of 4 squarely in the middle class. Yes, it isn't middle class as compared to the middle of the country but locally it is. If you make $250,000 annually in this area you live a middle class existence based on what everything you spend your money in costs. It's all relative, PP.

Okay, let's change the equation. If you took someone making $250K and they spent $150K on a stock portfolio, then complained that they only had to live a middle class existance, would you count them as middle class? If you had someone making $1M in Manhatten and they lived in a luxury $2.5M condo on the upper east side, and then could only afford a middle class existence, would you call them middle class? Living in prime locations is more expensive and that is a luxury. You have $150K more income a year than the true middle class. You chose to spend a lot of it on housing. Making such a choice is not like cancelling values on two sides of an equation. It's still additive. You earn more money than 95% of the area and you spend more than 95% of the area. In no way does this make you middle anything other than the middle of the top 10%.

[Anonymous]

Many of us can't live anywhere because we are here with the government and that's not going anywhere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Many of us can't live anywhere because we are here with the government and that's not going anywhere.

You don't need to be able to live "anywhere". There are homes and communities right in the DC area where you could live a middle class lifestyle on a middle class salary (100K) or a very affluent lifestyle on the 200 - 300K we're talking about here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Many of us can't live anywhere because we are here with the government and that's not going anywhere.

You don't need to be able to live "anywhere". There are homes and communities right in the DC area where you could live a middle class lifestyle on a middle class salary (100K) or a very affluent lifestyle on the 200 - 300K we're talking about here.

Eeek but then they'd have to move to PG county and live with the POORS, pp!! The horror, the horror!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think the choice argument only works if these families could move to lower cost of living areas and still make that much. That usually isn't the case.

The vast majority of families living in expensive DC, Bethesda, Chevy Chase or Arlington neighborhoods and complaining about cost of living, could move to Silver Spring, or PG County, or Burke and continue to work at the same jobs, and have the same income.

The PP was right. Short commutes, high scoring public schools, "walkable communities", these are luxuries. There's nothing wrong with wanting to have them, but they're expensive luxuries. If you're paying for them, and not making major sacrifices elsewhere, you probably aren't middle class.

+1 I live in PG County. Lots of *actual* middle class people in the region live here. We're not poor, not low income, but we make significantly less than $200k, and yet we work and live in this *region*.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are the schools in Silver Spring really that bad? Is SS lower than middle class economically? Seems pretty middle to upper middle for the most part to me, and seems more "middle class" than CC/Bethesda to me.

No, the Silver Spring schools are many and varied, and there are many solidly middle class communities within Silver Spring, as well as both poorer and more affluent communities. Some people prefer schools for their kids that are less diverse, and have more uniform test scores. There's not a lot of evidence that those kind of schools are better for middle class or affluent white kids, but some people have more confidence in them. If that's what a parent wants, they can choose it, but they need to understand that it's a luxury, and that purchasing a house in that neighborhood means that they'll likely have to choose other luxuries to go without.