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> The tightening economic climate and increasing difficulty of staying in the middle class... > But now a majority of people of all socioeconomic brackets yearn

by veryes 11y ago

> The tightening economic climate and increasing difficulty of staying in the middle class... > But now a majority of people of all socioeconomic brackets yearn for a middle-class existence... There is no middle class. This framing is itself toxic. There are only people who have to work for a living (i.e. the working class), and people for whom paid labor is optional due to accumulated capital of various forms (for simplicity, let's call them the rich.) Focusing on distinctions between substrata of the working class mainly benefits the rich.

m_fayer 11y ago
Although it's certainly subjective, I don't think what we call the middle class is such a fine-grained entity, and I do think the distinction between "working class" and "middle class" is useful. I would define "working class" as people who are resigned to whatever paid labor they can find on pain of hunger and homelessness. Anyone in this class wants to get out of it. The middle class, on the other hand, expect to get to pick the labor they perform, and in return expect a comfortable and secure existence as well as a good amount of leisure time and luxury to be attainable through their labor. Many in the middle class hold no ambition to climb still further, but are desperate to not fall out of it. The distinction is useful for shaping policy - we want to help as many people as possible into the middle class and out of the working class (as defined above), and then do everything possible to keep them there.
ryandrake 11y ago
This is a great comment, and succinctly states a point I've been trying to make for a long time. You either have to work for a living or you don't. The term "middle class" simply means you're N+M paychecks away from ruin rather than N paychecks away from ruin. When we say the middle class is disappearing, what we really mean is the percentage of working class people with a savings cushion is disappearing.

by veryes 11y ago

m_fayer 11y ago

Although it's certainly subjective, I don't think what we call the middle class is such a fine-grained entity, and I do think the distinction between "working class" and "middle class" is useful. I would define "working class" as people who are resigned to whatever paid labor they can find on pain of hunger and homelessness. Anyone in this class wants to get out of it. The middle class, on the other hand, expect to get to pick the labor they perform, and in return expect a comfortable and secure existence as well as a good amount of leisure time and luxury to be attainable through their labor. Many in the middle class hold no ambition to climb still further, but are desperate to not fall out of it. The distinction is useful for shaping policy - we want to help as many people as possible into the middle class and out of the working class (as defined above), and then do everything possible to keep them there.

ryandrake 11y ago

This is a great comment, and succinctly states a point I've been trying to make for a long time. You either have to work for a living or you don't. The term "middle class" simply means you're N+M paychecks away from ruin rather than N paychecks away from ruin. When we say the middle class is disappearing, what we really mean is the percentage of working class people with a savings cushion is disappearing.