Skiing is a big part of it. Look how many ski vacations Jared and Ivanka take. Not being a good skier is a dead giveaway that you did not grow up wealthy. Swimming is different. You need to know how to swim but many kids hate swim team. Private school is important too. It shows you are not watching your pennies and it opens up a whole different world compared to the public school crowd. Also, must have housekeeping/nanny help even if you are a SAHM. Outsource everything but keep up the facade that you are still insanely busy -managing personal trainer time, Barre, soul cycle, private coaching and tutoring for kids, and organizing 3-4 vacations a year (including Costa Rica, Aspen and Paris).

Anonymous wrote:This a useful, fascinating, and somewhat depressing thread. I totally identify with the OP; we were small-town middle class and now have a gross income that puts us in the 1%-ish demographic. I feel like my entire life since college has been spent trying to crack the code of all the things that I didn't know that everyone else did. It's even more extreme for my husband, whose family lost everything in a revolution before they fled here. He looked in amazement at our kids when they were ordering in a restaurant one day and said "I didn't know how to do that until I was in my 20s." His family never had the money to go out to dinner.

Here's the thing though - we don't try that hard to make our kids fit into some social standard of UMC. We want them to be smart, kind, well-behaved, interested in the world, and have a powerful moral compass. Beyond that, well, if they want to learn to ski, great, but it's not a priority.

Maybe we're just lazy, but part of being a once penniless, clueless immigrant helped give my husband incredible disdain for peer pressure. He literally could care less if other people don't think he's good enough because he can't ski; he knows he is because he knows what it took to get where he is. I don't have that inner confidence at all. One of our kids takes after him in that department and I really wish that both did.

Um, being UMC is not all about skiing. Sounds like to missed the boat on this discussion.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a poor immigrant family. We now have a seven figure HHI. I just try to expose my children to a lot of things. They know how to swim because I consider it a life skill that my parents did not teach to me.

If you went to HYP, I find it hard to believe that you don't know what an upper middle class lifestyle is. We want our kids to know the basics - how to play tennis, golf, ski, swim, etc. we vacation often. We eat out.

We are not and never will be country club people and that is fine. We have friends from all different backgrounds.

I went to HYP and don't know how to play tennis, golf, or ski and I swim poorly. Yikes! Better return my three Ivy League decrees!

Didn't you have to pass a swimming test before you graduated? It was required at Princeton when I went and I understood at Harvard and Yale too. Undergraduate lore was that the swimming test was instituted after the Titanic sunk and some graduates were lost because they didn't know how to swim. Always unclear how much knowing how to swim would have helped in the frigid waters.

It wouldn't have helped at all. Most people drown in cold water in seconds due to cold shock.

http://www.coldwatersafety.org/WhatIsCold.html

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the most hilarious threads I've ever read. So many people trying to self identify with a meaningless label. And such a trashy one!

+1000. Sheep following self-created social signals.

Why read it then? Why did you bother to comment?

It's always interesting to see what neuroses are trending among the social parasites.

Ah, our "parasite" poster has returned. You should get off these forums and try making some friends.

^ Says the person posting on an anonymous forum on a thread about raising "upper middle class" children.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a poor immigrant family. We now have a seven figure HHI. I just try to expose my children to a lot of things. They know how to swim because I consider it a life skill that my parents did not teach to me.

If you went to HYP, I find it hard to believe that you don't know what an upper middle class lifestyle is. We want our kids to know the basics - how to play tennis, golf, ski, swim, etc. we vacation often. We eat out.

We are not and never will be country club people and that is fine. We have friends from all different backgrounds.

I went to HYP and don't know how to play tennis, golf, or ski and I swim poorly. Yikes! Better return my three Ivy League decrees!

Didn't you have to pass a swimming test before you graduated? It was required at Princeton when I went and I understood at Harvard and Yale too. Undergraduate lore was that the swimming test was instituted after the Titanic sunk and some graduates were lost because they didn't know how to swim. Always unclear how much knowing how to swim would have helped in the frigid waters.

^^^ degrees

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in a poor immigrant family. We now have a seven figure HHI. I just try to expose my children to a lot of things. They know how to swim because I consider it a life skill that my parents did not teach to me.

If you went to HYP, I find it hard to believe that you don't know what an upper middle class lifestyle is. We want our kids to know the basics - how to play tennis, golf, ski, swim, etc. we vacation often. We eat out.

We are not and never will be country club people and that is fine. We have friends from all different backgrounds.

I went to HYP and don't know how to play tennis, golf, or ski and I swim poorly. Yikes! Better return my three Ivy League decrees!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the most hilarious threads I've ever read. So many people trying to self identify with a meaningless label. And such a trashy one!

+1000. Sheep following self-created social signals.

Why read it then? Why did you bother to comment?

It's always interesting to see what neuroses are trending among the social parasites.

Ah, our "parasite" poster has returned. You should get off these forums and try making some friends.

Anonymous wrote:Holy cow.

Literally nobody cares.

It's ALL in your head.

Clearly lots of social leeches on this thread do; it's gone on for 13 pages.

Holy cow.

Literally nobody cares.

It's ALL in your head.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:High end ski trips every winter or spring break with all the fancy gear and clothes. Sailing camp in the summer along with somewhere international once a year. Expensive sleep away camp in the summer. This is how you separate the poors from the wealthy at our private school. I won't tell you which camp we are in.

You're trying too hard. You definitely didn't grow up wealthy.

Or even "upper middle class", which is the topic of this thread.

Given that this is the money and finance forum, I am surprised at how few responses are focused on money management.

I have been around UMC from a variety of cultures and one thing they all seem to have in common is careful husbandry of resources. There are a few things they won't skimp on--books, education, and travel are typical--but otherwise purchases are made carefully weighing costs vs. benefits. (This may not be the case with the newly rich.)

Children often are taught to manage money through an allowance. Usually this is not tied to chores--those are things you do because you are a member of the family and you are supposed to pull your weight.

Rather, regular allowances are given to teach children how to weigh costs vs. benefits in terms of what they spend. Usually, it is not particularly generous. Allowance is never withheld for any reason, including as a disciplinary measure. (This could change in later years if a substance abuse problem is suspected. )

Clear rules about what the allowance is supposed to cover are set up front. Children are strongly encouraged to save part of their allowance, and many families encourage a portion be set aside for donations. For example, if the child is given five dollars a week, the recommendation may be to save $1 and contribute $1 as a donation.

The allowance is a valuable UMC tool for teaching both careful spending and the obligation to help those who are less fortunate.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the most hilarious threads I've ever read. So many people trying to self identify with a meaningless label. And such a trashy one!

+1000. Sheep following self-created social signals.

Why read it then? Why did you bother to comment?

It's always interesting to see what neuroses are trending among the social parasites.

Anonymous wrote:High end ski trips every winter or spring break with all the fancy gear and clothes. Sailing camp in the summer along with somewhere international once a year. Expensive sleep away camp in the summer. This is how you separate the poors from the wealthy at our private school. I won't tell you which camp we are in.

You're trying too hard. You definitely didn't grow up wealthy.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is one of the most hilarious threads I've ever read. So many people trying to self identify with a meaningless label. And such a trashy one!

+1000. Sheep following self-created social signals.

Why read it then? Why did you bother to comment?