Where do working class families live?

[Anonymous]

So Obama's salary should be capped at $50k? You are stupid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My stepfather is what some would consider 'working class'. He is a bus driver. His base pay is $85k. With overtime he makes about $130. He is a 25+ year union employee. He has No college education, owns two homes and has no debt and can retire with full pension when he wants. I consider him middle class.

This should explain why there is such outrage over public tax dollars and union salaries.

+1, non education public tax dollar jobs should be capped at 50k

50k is what a nanny makes
85K is not that much

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This should explain why there is such outrage over public tax dollars and union salaries.

+1, non education public tax dollar jobs should be capped at 50k

Hahahaha!

And when those 50k/year people quit, you'll replace them with 150k/year "consultants" and stick the public w the bill, right? F'n idiots.

Just a decade or so ago, people wondered why others took public sector jobs when private sector paid so much more and didn't see job security and benefits as important.

Well guess who's crying at the gates with torches and pitchforks at the "outrageous" pay the public sector jobs get?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:First time posting here, but, I don't understand why people who consider themselves blue-collar would take offense at the term "working class"? To me, that sounds higher than blue collar? (?) I mean, what's offensive about suggesting that one has to work to live? Nothing. (???)

"Blue collar" describes the type of work (trade). Working "class" is tinged by class issues, implies not "middle class," which everyone wants to be! If working class is "suggesting that one has to work to live" then why aren't "white collar" folks considered "working class"? No, you don't want that? Get it now?

Not really. DH and I are both white collar and pretty much work ourselves to death, so yeah, I'd consider us working class. Shrug. To me: working class means anyone who works. Then, you have two categories within that : white collar and blue collar.

Above all these folks are people who don't have to work, like trust fund mega-rich people with old family homes in Newport.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What about Burke? Seems like a family friendly area with decent schools, but a bit cheaper than closer-in 'burbs.

A single family home in Burke starts at $500k. Is that "working class" these days?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What about Burke? Seems like a family friendly area with decent schools, but a bit cheaper than closer-in 'burbs.

A single family home in Burke starts at $500k. Is that "working class" these days?

you can get them in the $400Kish range, but yeah, that cannot possibly be "working class"

[Anonymous]

Your class (eg. working class) tells how much money you make.

Collar color (blue or white) indicates what type of work you do. Generally blue collar is very hands-on type of work.

You can theoretically be upper class with a blue collar job or paid working class wages as a "white collar" lawyer.

[Anonymous]

working class is anyone who must work for a living, regardless of salary. yes, this includes people with 500K+ a year jobs too. Basically, if you must spend most hours of your day working to make a living, if you must go to work and cannot just decide not to without eventually going broke, you are working class. If you are a business owner, who has other workers running day-to-day things and managing business, or someone with really high networth who can live off of interest/investments returns, you are not working class, even if you do spend x hours a day to manage things and are aware of what is going on. If you own your time and get to decide when to wake up and when to do what, you are not working class. The rest, who don't own their time and must spend x number of hours just to make a living (regardless even if luxurious living) are working class. Ask yourself a question, can you just take off tomorrow on a whim to go on a trip for 1 month somewhere or even go for a couple of weeks, or just simply show up to work after lunch for a few days without negative repercussions, and if your answer is "no", you are working class.

Blue color/white color is the type of job you do, education required or not. This has nothing to do with wealth. A blue collar business owner (general contractor, builder, restaurant owner, store owner, etc) can be way ahead of a white collar engineer, accountant, lawyer, etc living paycheck to paycheck.

There are tons of people with 6 figure salaries that live paycheck to paycheck, because their expenses and lifestyle expectations, consumption habits are very high. Even ultra rich people with 100+mil networth go bankrupt.

[Anonymous]

PP, you have just made up your own definition of working class. Which I guess you can, if you want to, but it isn't the commonly held definition.

Is a SAHM not working class, then, if she is married to a plumber, because she gets to do what she will with her own time?

[Anonymous]

Many of you are wrong.

Working class is another term for proletariat, essentially defined as "A social class of industrial societies broadly composed of people involved in manual occupation. The bulk of these jobs are unskilled, poorly paid and provide few benefits or job security. "

The skilled workers within the grouping of "working class" are blue collar workers--carpenters, plumbers, and electricians. They often make more money than workers in the middle class, but their jobs are frequently more physically taxing, and don't require formal education such as a university degree.

That is working class. Nurses are not working class, for someone who mentioned them upthread somewhere.

It's sociology--surely all the well educated elites on DCUM took that at their tony universities?

[Anonymous]

14:06, read 14:33 please.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This should explain why there is such outrage over public tax dollars and union salaries.

+1, non education public tax dollar jobs should be capped at 50k

Hahahaha!

And when those 50k/year people quit, you'll replace them with 150k/year "consultants" and stick the public w the bill, right? F'n idiots.

Just a decade or so ago, people wondered why others took public sector jobs when private sector paid so much more and didn't see job security and benefits as important.

Well guess who's crying at the gates with torches and pitchforks at the "outrageous" pay the public sector jobs get?

If you make a pension and have union benigfits 85K a year is like 150k a year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So Obama's salary should be capped at $50k? You are stupid.

I think the PP is stating that uneducated manual labor should be capped

[Anonymous]

85K is a good salary and not working class (esp with OT income netting another 45K in income). 130k is a damn good salary.

Working class is the cashier at Target, your daycare provider who makes 35K, the cook at Chick Fila.

[Anonymous]

Are teachers working class? Say a teacher makes 70k/yr...working class? I vote no ,even though lots of union worker jobs may make more than the teacher and I'd perhaps consider them working class.