What is considered middle class where you live?

Median family income is steady in 2019

The median after-tax income of Canadian families and unattached individuals was $62,900 in 2019, up 0.5%, which was not a statistically significant change over 2018.Mar 23, 2021

The Daily — Canadian Income Survey, 2019 – Statistique Canadahttps://www150.statcan.gc.ca › daily-quotidien

Googling it, for New Jersey families of four the range for middle class is between $60,000 and $177,000.

According to one source, the range for “middle class” in the Bay Area is anywhere from $74,750 to $261,623. In my hometown of Atherton, the median income is above $250,000 (at which point they simply stop counting).

Middle class here are people who can afford to move away but can’t afford to buy a house here.

According to Google the Median income is $64,000 here where I live, The Villages, FL.

So, $42,000 to $128,000.

But, something like 50% of the people in my community own their homes outright and a large number are retired.

About $70k-$100k here in SW Mo. Most do own their homes.

@KNOWITALL They own the homes outright? No mortgage?

2021 stats on this:
Income needed to be considered middle class: $29,905 – $145,009 for Massachusetts

Median Family income for my town is 143K

@JLeslie With mortgage. Generally the loans are fairly small though, we tend to stick to moderate homes rather than showplaces.

Here, average media per capita is about 69k and average household median income is about 141k. Lots of people here are independently wealthy or work in NYC Wall Street types plus some celebrities or children of celebrities. Horse country, equestrians, etc.

@KNOWITALL I mentioned the home ownership on my answer only because since so many people have no mortgage, their income might be low, but their monthly expenses are low, so the income is a little deceptive since they still have discretionary income to spend, and since many are retired, many have savings they can spend too. Some do live check to check on social security though, or on very little.

Since your area has reasonably priced housing and low mortgages it’s a similar situation.

I think it’s really interesting to see how middle class varies depending on where you are. Like it makes sense, obviously. But it’s also surprising at the same time?

It’s also [synonym for interesting ] to think about what middle class means without the numbers. Is it owning a house outright without a mortgage? How do you factor in retirees?

@kritiper’s idea of middle class is an [synonym for interesting ] idea to consider.

Haha…just realized I used interesting three times.

I find it interesting that in the past some jellies were busy saying The Villages, FL is full of rich, white, racist people, but really our median income is fairly average. Similar to a typical middle class suburb. Maybe not everyone is racist either. Maybe, The Villages is misrepresented in the news in many ways.

@JLeslie It looks like the white part is pretty accurate (98% white).

The rich part is hard to gauge when it’s usually measured by median income and most retirees are…well, retired. I don’t think we have numbers for people’s bank accounts.

Most retired people are living on a fixed income although there are some living in squalor and some in mansions. Maybe people assume that The Villages’ residents are racists because of their political affiliations. I’m not sure where the residents stand as far as their politics.

@jca2

2020 presidential election
32159……64%
32162……71%
32163……68%
34484……71%
34731……69%
34785……57%

More red than I’m comfortable with. But by no means the reddest in that area of Florida.

I’d imagine their reputation comes from being a popular place for republican campaigning.

@raum I’m always shocked when I see the 98%! Lol. I’m pretty sure that’s Sumter County not The Villages. Still, admittedly, it’s very white here, but my world isn’t. My friends here are mostly white non-Hispanic I guess, but plenty of Latin American friends, one Black Hispanic, one Pakistani-Scottish (Lives in UK most of the year) one Chilean-German, one friend Hawaiian who is Portuguese and something else, but I would count her as white. I do folk dancing and we are white, but half of us are Jewish, a couple Latin Americans, one is Arab from Latin America, also some Asians, big Asian club. My world is diverse. Meaning, my circles and activities I do.

Meanwhile, very white doesn’t necessarily mean racist.

Those zip codes are in The Villages AND also run out of The Villages into other parts of the counties, and the counties are fairly rural surrounding The Villages and very Republican or voted for Republicans but registered Independent.

Edit: LGBT community here too. Small, but not invisible. They have weekly meet-ups at a restaurant near me. 50–150 people show up depending on time of year. That’s not nothing. That’s not the whole community, I just mean who shows up to socialize.

@jca2 is right that income doesn’t really measure wealth, especially among the retired.

The Villages is its own CDP.

@raum Thanks for doing some searching! Our population is 130,000. Maybe some of that is snowbirds who aren’t Florida residents, but they are still people we interact with. Your link says 80,000. That sort of thing always makes me wonder if they are counting all three counties. That sounds like The Villages just in Sumter County. Plus, When I look at voting data, like registration, it’s all by County, I can’t find it for The Villages proper. Maybe I’m just not finding it.

@jleslie- I wonder if the information is compiled somewhere.

@jca2 I’d love to know the real deal.

No doubt there are plenty of Republicans here, including Trumpers and even QAnon’s as I’ve mentioned before, but I think there are more Democrats than usually quoted, and more minorities too, but still very heavy white. I wouldn’t be surprised if we are 90% white, but 98% seems off to me.

It’s estimated 2% Jewish, that’s in the white number. @raum’s link says 1.2% Hispanic. Seems low, but maybe. Blacks .4%. There are very few Black people, but in the last two years the numbers seem to be increasing a lot.

We aren’t a major metropolitan area though, we are a city in the middle of nowhere, so it’s not so unusual in the US to be very white.

Probably around 60k a year per household. My small SW Iowa town only has around 1500 people. Theres not a lot of extreme poverty, but theres no one that would be considered wealthy