What social class are you and how do you detremine which class that you belong to?

Part of the dying middle class.

I teeter between upper and lower middle class depending on how much I make in a given year.i am a highly skilled tradesman and it takes longer to master my trade and become a practicing journeyman in my trade than it does to earn a four year degree.

Upper middle class determined by my household income and education level.

I grew up lower middle class as a young girl, eventually we were more middle middle in terms of income. But, my father has a PhD and my mom has a college degree too and that can play into where you fall in the socioeconomic strata. They still live in the same neighborhood where I grew up which is considered lower middle class now and actually going down.

I make under 10K USD per year but never really worry about money. Cheap rent, don’t drive, no kids, loves ramen. I am the American dream!

Lower middle,and how much you gross determines where you fit in.

Raised middle class but income would now suggest lower class, to my way of thinking it’s determined in the mind, my mind/thinking is definitely middle-class.

Solidly in the middle class. The rapidly disappearing middle class thanks to income inequality. New York is the state with the highest income inequality (a little fact I learned at a conference I just attended today).

Raised upper middle class, sustained middle class until 2010, now I am damn near suicidally poor. Bah Humbug! Fucking bullshit, I am so angry at the state of affairs.

Middle.

Too rich to receive grants for my child’s college tuition…so middle class??? Yet too poor to afford it without a second mortgage.

Upper middle based on education and income; solidly middle based on debt and spousal support requirements after a nasty divorce.

Lower.

Solidly middle, but increasingly uneasy in the knowledge that I could not duplicate the feat had I been born 20 years later. It is distressing to realize, that in this matter, Marx (as usual) was correct. The gradients to a concept as wispy as class are many and varied, and this works to the motives of those among us would like to pretend that America is a place where class is irrelevant. Once one views our society and the issues confronting it as matters of class struggle, things suddenly jump into focus.

According to the Thompson & Hickey Chart , we are Upper Middle Class.

I grew up lower middle to middle class.

Most of my life has been in the lower middle class. My parents didn’t earn much, and then I was a single mother who wound up in bankruptcy. With our combined income, my fiancé and I are more solidly in the middle class, but not enough so we have a healthy savings account and big retirement funds. I still worry about our future now that we are also over the hill in the life-cycle.

Lumpenproleteriat—but I don’t feel like explaining the category or why exactly. Let’s just say that I’ve avoided being incorporated into a particular culture and mode of behaviour that one might associate with the working classes and the so-called “middle-class”. Lumpenproletariat in the Bakuninist sense, since Marx was yet again wrong regarding this matter.

It seems that few Americans like to refer to themselves as “working class”. What is it you all think much of the middle-class does exactly? Live off unearned income and/or the labour of others?

The retirement crisis is hitting 80% of us boomers really hard.
The future of elderly living in poverty is terrifying.
I have read that most boomers have 30k or less in retirement funds.
Suicides are soaring in middle aged people such as myself that have lost everything, work, savings, homes in this economic shitstorm.

Hardly what many of us expected. :-(
The number of 50+ peeps out of work is astounding.

www.overfiftyandoutofwork.com

@Coloma Consider that productivity has increased. More goods are produced using less time, labour and energy that at any point in human civilisation. We consume the things we produce, and a part of that consumption goes toward satisfying our physical and psychological well-being; like having enough food, warmth, shelter, intellectual stimulation, play, etc.

We should actually be working less and retiring earlier, but mysteriously we do not (it’s actually not that mysterious).

Why is it that most people are compelled to work long hours and retired ever later to earn the required wealth they need to live a normal life and satisfy their physical and psychological well-being? (And working long hours into late age is a detriment to both those things.)

The luxury goods market is booming. Maybe that’s a clue.

@Kropotkin Well..that was my goal, and I was semi-retired in my mid-40’s, but luxury businesses are the first to go when the economy tanks.
I worked in interior design and by 2010 nobody was seeking either personal design, or home staging as they were during the housing bubble. I made excellent money, split a commission on the sale price of homes my partner and I staged/designed and made out handsomely.
I’m the first to support not working until the grave but alas, this is not the reality for many, sadly so.

I am grateful I enjoyed the years of prosperity I did, and I took nothing for granted.
Every single day for years I gave thanks for my good fortune. Once you have tasted the joys and freedoms of a particular lifestyle that syncs up with your intrinsic nature it is not easy to be demoted again.
It is true, do something you love and you will never work a day in your life.

At this point I would rather die than work at fucking Walmart in my advancing age.

@cookieman Interesting that the Beeghley model takes into account net worth and how that changes the distribution from Thompson and Hickey Chart. I always think in terms of income and education level, but net worth probably should be considered also.