Upper middle class

[Anonymous]

As the commercial says, "Some people are stupid rich."

A lot of them are on this thread claiming to be "upper middle" class. SMH.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We are in our mid-30's with a HHI of $800k. DH is a doctor and I work in finance. We live in a million dollar home, drive nice cars and go on luxury vacations. We are not country club people. We will be able to easily pay for our children's college education. We are upper middle class.

Exhibit 1. Stupid rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am upper middle class. Spouse and I are both educated professionals. Our income is about $500K, $50K of which is unearned. We are not upper class yet because we don't have enough money to stop work and live off our unearned income. To me, once our HHI became $300K, we became upper middle class.

Exhibit #2. Stupid rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our situation is unique in that I have a trust, so while I SAH and my husband makes $300K (which maybe would be UMC?) our annual gifting creates a different set of circumstances. The kids have trusts set up as well, so we don't have to save for their college, which removes a huge burden. Because we receive an annual gift of $56,000 (tax free) it changes a lot about our lifestyle. He travels quite a bit, so we are able to take free vacations with mileage to their homes in two different vacation destinations, which is extremely helpful. While his salary and ESPP and stock/bonuses alone would make our life comfortable (for sure!) its really the annual gifting that puts things into a different category for us. Also, the knowledge that ~ at some point, god willing, assuming we stay in good health, we will inherit a huge amount of money, is a sort of safety net. That said, he still maxes out his 401K and we save as aggressively as we can.

I know that we are extremely fortunate to have such circumstances, we routinely donate a flat 20% of what we are gifted to charity as well as run an annual fundraiser, and try to give back in as many ways as we can, as well as raise our 2 kids to be civic minded from their (young) ages. We live nicely but humbly (house is 750K inside beltway) and below our means, our friends would never guess we have this trust.

Because of this I would consider us upper middle class.

Exhibit #3. Stupid rich.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sounds like we're getting there, but we still might have a problem with the middle class being too large. If we use what we have in the thread so far we have:

Upper Class - HHI of 550k and higher
Upper Middle Class - HHI of 300k - 549k
Middle Class - HHI of 75k - 299k (seems too much of a range, no?)...

For a family of 4

1% >$400k
Upper class > $250k
Upper middle $150k-250k
Middle Class $100-150
Lower middle class $75k-100k

Yeah, this sounds about right to me for the DC area (I'd move those amounts way down in other parts of the country.)

My family is upper middle by this scale, and that's exactly the way it feels to me. Definitely living higher on the hog than I did during my middle class childhood.

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So every other class is about money and wealth but upper class is entirely a social construct -- you have to be born into it? Whatever were we thinking when we didn't make George Washington King of America???

No I didn't mean to put it this way.I was implying that not only HHI and net worth defines upper class(in my eyes!).And definetely does not define alone.You can become upper class or can be born with it,it's a mix of education+inner standards+tastes+way of thinking.It can all be developed with time,desire and of course money,or can be inborn.

I was the original poster of this idea of class as also including a social construct.

I grew up in a lower middle to middle class family. Same with my husband. We now have HHI over 700K a year, but we still have the mentality and values of the middle class, and that is why I think a big part of class is determined by your upbringing. We may earn a very decent living, but I don't consider us "upper class. "

By attending a highly rigorous entrance exam public magnet school in a large city, I was able to get an excellent HS education which helped me get into the Ivies for undergrad and grad school. This put me on the path to high HHI as an adult, much more than my parents, and we are well on our way to building a high net worth, but the habits and values are ingrained from our childhood.

We don't outsource housecleaning or garden work, we clip coupons, shop the sales at the grocery store and Target. Our splurges were a nanny for the kids when they were young because the cost of two daycares for two kids less than 2 years apart was about the same as a nanny anyway, and private preschool/kindergarten for the kids. We will be transferring them to public school for elementary. I don't feel comfortable around 'rich people" or conspicuous consumption and we prefer to live in a low key neighborhood with house values much below what we could afford based on our HHI. We will not be joining any country clubs. We do plan to do lots of nice family vacations, including international locales on a yearly basis, but stay in modest hotels, no lavish resorts or suites.

I feel firmly upper middle class--middle middle from upbringing, and now upper middle based on our adult life circumstances.

[Anonymous]

HHI alone cannot make you 'rich'. Net Worth makes you rich.


This is not to say that HHI is unimportant, but you can be a high earner and not be rich, especially if you have only made a big jump in income recently. It takes time to fill up the columns in your sheet - retirement, college savings, etc. It is much easier to do this with a higher HHI, but that doesn't make you rich. It makes you affluent, which over time, might allow you to be wealthy if you play your cards well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our situation is unique in that I have a trust, so while I SAH and my husband makes $300K (which maybe would be UMC?) our annual gifting creates a different set of circumstances. The kids have trusts set up as well, so we don't have to save for their college, which removes a huge burden. Because we receive an annual gift of $56,000 (tax free) it changes a lot about our lifestyle. He travels quite a bit, so we are able to take free vacations with mileage to their homes in two different vacation destinations, which is extremely helpful. While his salary and ESPP and stock/bonuses alone would make our life comfortable (for sure!) its really the annual gifting that puts things into a different category for us. Also, the knowledge that ~ at some point, god willing, assuming we stay in good health, we will inherit a huge amount of money, is a sort of safety net. That said, he still maxes out his 401K and we save as aggressively as we can.

I know that we are extremely fortunate to have such circumstances, we routinely donate a flat 20% of what we are gifted to charity as well as run an annual fundraiser, and try to give back in as many ways as we can, as well as raise our 2 kids to be civic minded from their (young) ages. We live nicely but humbly (house is 750K inside beltway) and below our means, our friends would never guess we have this trust.

Because of this I would consider us upper middle class.

Exhibit #3. Stupid rich.

Stupid rich because they are living humbly or stupid rich because they don't consider themselves rich ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are middle class, then you bring your lunch to work, you mow your own lawn, you clean your own house. You go on vacation for one week at the beach or the mountains. You spend your other vacation with family. You have two big spurge vacations for your children to remember when they are growing up- one to Disney and you stay at the value hotels if you stay on site. Your children go to public school swim in local pools, join the scouts and play baseball- but not year round. Your children go to scout sleep away camp and maybe a week at camp grandma. You may go to church, synogogue or mosque, or not. You drive american cars or honda and toyotas. You save up and scrimp for things. You go camping. Your children get financial aid when they go to college. They take a few AP classes, but no prep classes for SATs or CogAts. In HS, your children do not have their own car.

You are upper middle class if you do the above, but out source a few things, like lawn care or have a every other week cleaner. You get to take your kids to Europe once and they may get to go again in HS with a group. When you go to disney you stay at the second tier hotels, if you stay on site. You save up frequent flyer miles for trips. You can pay for college if you save and you are likely to by the prepaid tuition play for state schools. Your children take private music lessons, they may be on a travel sports team, they go to a few weeks of expensive science camps or art or theatre camps- but not the whole summer. They are on the a summer swim team at a local private pool. They are also in scouts. They take 6 AP classes and have tutors when they stumble. In HS, your children drive a 10+ year old handme down car. Your children may have learned to ski locally and ski once or twice each year- day trips each time.

You are in the wealthy class if you outsource most of the above, have nanny instead of SACC, take an expensive vacation every year, belong to a country club and/or have your children in private school. Your children drive a newer car or perhaps you bought it specifically for them. Your children have had a tutor most of their lives to get an edge. They take 8-12 APs. You may stay a month or more "at the beach" or "in the mountains" or in France in the summer. Your children know how to ski and ski for winter break every year. Your children have been to London, Paris and Hawaii. They have been to NYC several times. They have had a apple phone since 5th grade and unlimited texts and data (or enough).

We have an HHI of $100k. We fit parts of each of those categories (see bold). Where does that put us? Kids are young (7 and 4) so several parts don't apply yet. But some parts would never be part of my lifestyle. E.g. even if we were billionaires I wouldn't buy my kids brand new cars when they learn to drive, or send them to private school. I also have no interest in Disney, but if we did we'd stay in our own beach front condo that's about an hour's drive away.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our situation is unique in that I have a trust, so while I SAH and my husband makes $300K (which maybe would be UMC?) our annual gifting creates a different set of circumstances. The kids have trusts set up as well, so we don't have to save for their college, which removes a huge burden. Because we receive an annual gift of $56,000 (tax free) it changes a lot about our lifestyle. He travels quite a bit, so we are able to take free vacations with mileage to their homes in two different vacation destinations, which is extremely helpful. While his salary and ESPP and stock/bonuses alone would make our life comfortable (for sure!) its really the annual gifting that puts things into a different category for us. Also, the knowledge that ~ at some point, god willing, assuming we stay in good health, we will inherit a huge amount of money, is a sort of safety net. That said, he still maxes out his 401K and we save as aggressively as we can.

I know that we are extremely fortunate to have such circumstances, we routinely donate a flat 20% of what we are gifted to charity as well as run an annual fundraiser, and try to give back in as many ways as we can, as well as raise our 2 kids to be civic minded from their (young) ages. We live nicely but humbly (house is 750K inside beltway) and below our means, our friends would never guess we have this trust.

Because of this I would consider us upper middle class.

Exhibit #3. Stupid rich.

Stupid rich because they are living humbly or stupid rich because they don't consider themselves rich ?

The latter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am upper middle class. Spouse and I are both educated professionals. Our income is about $500K, $50K of which is unearned. We are not upper class yet because we don't have enough money to stop work and live off our unearned income. To me, once our HHI became $300K, we became upper middle class.

Exhibit #2. Stupid rich.

"Thanks."