4 ms·

There was a post last month where the comments went into how the wealthy don't consider themselves "upper class". One fellow said he had $8M in investments but

by keenerd 13y ago

There was a post last month where the comments went into how the wealthy don't consider themselves "upper class". One fellow said he had $8M in investments but did not feel "upper class" due to lack of influence/respect. Completely oblivious to the fact that he could cash out the investments, never work again and still be in the top 20% income bracket. Here is how to become middle class. Go to school, get good grades, get a job. Here is how to become "upper class". Get a pile of money. Stop working. Start accumulating influence and respect. The $8M dollar working man is like a grad student who never leaves school. He keeps accumulating little bits of paper that say how awesome he is, but are worthless in the larger game. He never moves onto the next step. Oh, and if you can't figure out how to gain influence/respect, get out of the Valley. You are a medium-sized fish in a giant pond. Find a smaller pond. Throw a dart at a US map, move to that town. Buy every piece of land that goes up for sale. Get involved in local politics, the Zoning Board will probably have the best results. Hire people and build your dream.

derefr 13y ago
By the traditional definitions, you have the lower class (proletariat), middle class (bourgeoisie), and upper class (aristocracy). People who work for someone else--in exchange for a wage meted out by that someone else--are lower class, no matter how high-up they are in their particular organization. Business owners (though this includes freelancers) form the middle class. People who have enough power to control the rules by which capital is allocated in the economy (and thereby basically have unlimited wealth, in a sense) are upper class. This used to be royalty, and those who could afford to spend all day bowing and scraping to them; in the modern day, it's congress, and the leaders of the industries who can afford to lobby them. Interestingly, this class structure has been "rediscovered" in modern-day discourse, in the form of the MacLeod corporate hierarchy. It's harder to recognize within the context of a single corporation, but when you analyze, say, all of Silicon Valley in those terms (http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/tag/vcistan/ http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/tag/vcistan/), the class-structure leaps right out.
- dragonwriter 13y ago
  > By the traditional definitions, you have the lower class (proletariat), middle class (bourgeoisie), and upper class (aristocracy). People who work for someone else--in exchange for a wage meted out by that someone else--are lower class, no matter how high-up they are in their particular organization. The "traditional" scheme I'm most familiar with has the proletariat, the petit bourgeosie, and the haute borgeoisie; that is, the post-aristocratic system used in 19th century discussions of capitalist society. The petit bourgeosie includes both what would, in modern terms, be elite and white collar workers (technical experts, managers, etc.) and small business owners (who may technically be 'capitalist', but are nevertheless are dependent largely on their own labor for support even if it is not wage labor), while the haute bourgeousie are the major capitalists. Both the proletariat (lower class) and much of the petit bourgeosie (middle class) work at wage labor, and the proletariat and the whole of the petit bourgeosie are dependent on their ability to find a market for their labor for their living. The haute bourgeosie corresponds very closely to how you describe the aristocracy, but the distinction between the proletariat and the petit bourgeosie is not at the point where your description draws the line between the proletariat and the bourgeosie; business ownership isn't the sine qua non of the middle class.
prostoalex 13y ago
>>> Completely oblivious to the fact that he could cash out the investments, never work again and still be in the top 20% income bracket. All fun and well until he needs medical treatment.

by keenerd 13y ago

derefr 13y ago

By the traditional definitions, you have the lower class (proletariat), middle class (bourgeoisie), and upper class (aristocracy). People who work for someone else--in exchange for a wage meted out by that someone else--are lower class, no matter how high-up they are in their particular organization. Business owners (though this includes freelancers) form the middle class. People who have enough power to control the rules by which capital is allocated in the economy (and thereby basically have unlimited wealth, in a sense) are upper class. This used to be royalty, and those who could afford to spend all day bowing and scraping to them; in the modern day, it's congress, and the leaders of the industries who can afford to lobby them. Interestingly, this class structure has been "rediscovered" in modern-day discourse, in the form of the MacLeod corporate hierarchy. It's harder to recognize within the context of a single corporation, but when you analyze, say, all of Silicon Valley in those terms (http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/tag/vcistan/ http://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/tag/vcistan/), the class-structure leaps right out.

dragonwriter 13y ago
> By the traditional definitions, you have the lower class (proletariat), middle class (bourgeoisie), and upper class (aristocracy). People who work for someone else--in exchange for a wage meted out by that someone else--are lower class, no matter how high-up they are in their particular organization. The "traditional" scheme I'm most familiar with has the proletariat, the petit bourgeosie, and the haute borgeoisie; that is, the post-aristocratic system used in 19th century discussions of capitalist society. The petit bourgeosie includes both what would, in modern terms, be elite and white collar workers (technical experts, managers, etc.) and small business owners (who may technically be 'capitalist', but are nevertheless are dependent largely on their own labor for support even if it is not wage labor), while the haute bourgeousie are the major capitalists. Both the proletariat (lower class) and much of the petit bourgeosie (middle class) work at wage labor, and the proletariat and the whole of the petit bourgeosie are dependent on their ability to find a market for their labor for their living. The haute bourgeosie corresponds very closely to how you describe the aristocracy, but the distinction between the proletariat and the petit bourgeosie is not at the point where your description draws the line between the proletariat and the bourgeosie; business ownership isn't the sine qua non of the middle class.

prostoalex 13y ago

>>> Completely oblivious to the fact that he could cash out the investments, never work again and still be in the top 20% income bracket. All fun and well until he needs medical treatment.