Are you middle class?

oh I'm surprised Joflake - the heritage/generational thing is something new to me. I understand that children of middle class families tend to remain middle class by influence of upbringing but I thought it could change if they were the children of working class e.g. Gordon Ramsay or Sir Alan Sugar - even though they are both in the upper middle in my definition.

This is a topic that interests me actually as I had very little class awareness until I went away to university at 18 and was then surprised at the level of importance (some) people placed on class (or perceived class anyway).

My mum would probably consider herself working-class (I have even heard her refer to the family as "upper working-class" whatever that means!) but she is a teacher and my step-dad works in computer design, they own their own home, have a car each etc. They're not wealthy by any means but certainly not on the breadline. I would say that really we are a middle class family with working class roots.

H and I are both research scientists. We are at the start of our respective careers and pretty skint but I think most people would consider us middle class regardless of financial situation or background.

I think attitude is important too. For example, H's parents are more comfortable financially than mine but his family are much more stereotypically "working-class" in terms of their outlook and ideals, for example, they place little to no importance on education.

A bit of a ramble there but hopefully it mostly makes sense.

I have to disagree with Joflake, I consider myself working class but i'm not on benefits and I have a good job. I perceive Middle Class people to be well off, maybe earning £30k plus a year and with a degree ? or at least with further education of some description such as A-levels etc. and a good career.

I guess it depends on location etc. aswell. As I say I consider £30k plus a year to be good wages, someone living in London might disagree.

An interesting book on this subject is Watching the English. It covers quite a lot of class stuff.

Not sure what I am tbh.My parents are definitely middle class as were their parents, so I suppose I hold a lot of the middle class values, whatever they are.

But I married a working class man, and although we live in a middle class area (thanks to my parents letting this house to us) we don't have a lot of money so I suppose I have become more working class.To sum up, I haven't a bloody clue!

I would also say that I don't think of working class as on benefits, but I don't think you can tell too much by wages. I think I am about as middle class as they come, but in the UK I was earning under 25k, on the outskirts of London, mainly due to the nature of my work. Science Communication is not a highly paid profession ?

I think my perception of class comes more from the nature of work - blue collar vs white collar sort of thing.

I think a lot of it's about attitude, as well as upbringing, it's hard to describe, but since I've moved to local government I would consider half of my office to be middle class, half to be working - despite most being on the same salary, it's just how and what they buy, how they respond to situations etc.

I do think it's a multi faceted reason for you being a particular "class", upbringing obviously plays a large part, as does education, income (to a small extent), job function, and as I said, the very hard to describe attitude to life.

I'm not sure what I am. H says we are lower middle class. My parents are very working class - my dad is a lorry driver and my mum is a cleaner but I'd find it hard to fit both me and my brother into that group as we are both graduates with good jobs (he's a teacher and I'm a software developer). H's family are very middle class - they live in knaresborough and you don't get much more middle class than that ?

If you think John Lewis and Sainsbury's are posh does that make you working class? ?

It surprises me that people think it's about money, tbh. Although chronically skint, my family is def middle class. And a plumber, even if he'd made a fortune and was controlling a plumbing empire, would still be working class. It's more about attitude, mannerisms etc. I'd say Surallan appears far less posh and more working class than Gordon.

Hmm, would it be a really bad idea to play "guess the Hitcher class"?

You're welcome to label me?

Hmm, would it be a really bad idea to play "guess the Hitcher class"?

You're welcome to label me?

Possibly flowery, possibly.

I'm going to try and word this without sounding snobbish and upsetting people. I find the working class, and lower middle class attitude (as a generalisation) is a need to have the best of everything, and this is their goal in life, and to tell people about it. As you probably notice, it's often those who can least afford it who have the best and biggest of everything (although I don't agree byand large income defines class) I find in general middle middles have a big chip on their shoulder wanting to either be higher class, or back to working class, possibly as it's easier to define those "positions" in society, and upper middle and upper, don't really care what anyone else thinks.

I'm reading that book at the moment btw, it's making me think too much about these things.

Am I making any sense, or does everyone hate me now? ?

I'm agreeing with the attitudes and values as an addition to my main criteria of middle class but all this adds up to my view still that a person can be middle class even if their parents are working class.

So my views on it are shared but my friends view of the class distinction as being determined by the family they come from can't be that uncommon if Joflake has the same view,

With the salary indication, what if you're married to someone who earns more than 30K but you earn less than 20k say - would you be on different class levels? ? I think this is where more than income comes in and it would also be shared wealth that defines if you both fit the same bill broadly with jobs, values, education, etc.

I guess I think of class in terms of standard of living which by all accounts, is the wrong way of looking at it.

Haagweg - I think your parents will have some influence over your class though, as they have a heavy influence on your upbringing, and this will define who you are in many ways.

I do however agree that IMO you could go from working to middle middle class in a generation, but I think upper middle to upper wouldnt be possible

I disagree strongly with what you say, Joflake. My family and my husband's family are very similar; of working class jobs (factory workers, clerical workers, train drivers, shop assistants etc) but they were all extremely proud, hard working people. They all own their own homes, have holidays, no credit etc. They aren't rich but they live by their means, and they aren't dishonest or lazy in any way. I really admire people who break their backs doing physically demanding, boring (low paid) jobs when there must come a point when it'd be easier to stay at home all day watching television and claiming benefits. I wonder what the financial difference is, £50? £100? At what point is it easier to stay in than go out to work?

As for H and I, God knows. We are both university educated, have professional careers and at one point were earning 10 times what our parents were earning (not now though ?) We own our own cars etc but, ultimately, we were brought up by working class people with working class values. Which I am very proud of.

However, I am not sure what position that leaves our children in ....

Class is bollocks, really, isn't it?

Probably not a great idea Zebra ? - this is how my conversation with my friend came up and it appeared that we just had different views as to what middle and working class was and we couldn't agree so not really comparing like with like. She said she was 'working class and proud' and yet she found someone she termed to be middle class by upbringing and standard of living to be out of her league ?. I disagreed with both as well as the upbringing/heritage issue.?

Yes Clairy, on the whole class is bollocks. However, it's amazing how you can meet somebody with whom you gel, and you later find out that you come from similar backgrounds and have similar types of family lives, whereas people that I find a little exotic or hard to 'get' are generally from a very different background/ life.

Influence in upbringing and values but values aren't class defined. Example, parents may be working class by job type, what they earn and therefore not living in an affluent area. But they may instil a strong sense of work ethic and educational emphasis so their children goes to university, gets a good job, earns more than average and live in an affluent area. Does this mean that the child will be defined as working class still when I think they fit all the other criteria of middle class impressions. And if so what makes them working class besides their roots?

This is a nice debate. Whereas with my friend it did get a bit heated at one point ?

I think that this is broadly true, but a relatively recent phenomenom. Until the last few decades, the lines of demaracation were more distinct, and the middle class were a type of working class who held professional or higher level mangerial roles, but who lived in the leafy suburbs, had tennis club membership, went on skiing holidays as well as a summer holiday etc etc. In the late 80s and since then, the professional market has contracted when directly compared to certain trades (plumbers being one which springs instantly to mind) , and so certain families of tradesmen experienced a new standard of living, were able to move to such suburbs, their children sent to tennis and cello lessons, their parents going onto the golf club committee etc. This I think has created a form of peer envy amongst the 'working' class people who saw their old neighbours move on, and a real 'keeping up with the Joneses' ensued. Looking back though, I'm not sure that working class people in the 50s were aspiring to have a better TV (or would that be wireless) than their doctor or lawyer had.

Also, while I think what Sophie says has a lot of merit, I do think that to some extent, money can buy you into a different perceived class. Of course, it can rarely buy you taste. ?

ooo interesting post. I recently had this conversation and we also compared how class was perceived in other countries as well as the different "criteria" in different cultures.

Could I ask what you feel would be the criteria so to say for upper class? Would it have to be aristocracy[sp]?

I agree with some of the posters that money doesn't really have much to do with it anymore. For example you get people that have made millions in very short time and are still very much working class yet you get many in the aristocracy which are skint yet still upper class...

I agree with Numbnuts - I would define class as more about attitude and way of life rather than the other elements. To me, income is the least helfpul indicator. One example of this would be my best friend in primary school was very poor, lived in a tiny little council flat, mum on benefits but she was definitely middle class. It was more about the values her mum had. She did drama classes, dancing, musical instruments, her mum was very in to poetry and literature...perhaps some of you are crying "that isn't necessarily middle class" but compared to my upbringing it was. There were probably a number of other things that made her middle class in my mind, impossible to remember and list here.

I was bought up on a council estate to a single parent who didn't work. I'd say most of the children on our estate were what you might describe as 'chavs' based on clothes they wore, how they would try and act hard and talk about shagging boys, they'd smoke from ages of about 10, some shoplift....not painting a very nice picture but I wasn't like this - down to my mum bringing me up better than that and that I was a 'square' and was the only one in my school to pass the 12 plus, the first in about 3 years! At primary school, I would help the teachers listen to other children read and I remember two boys at aged 12 when we left who could not tell the time by an analogue watch!

I went to a girl's grammar and perceived everyone else there to be middle/upper class though I realise now this was probably false. So this school and subsquently going to Uni slowly changed my attitudes and outlook on life...so I would consider myself to hold middle class values and I realise many others look at me as middle class, certainly on paper (degree and 3 postgarduate quals, soon to have a Doctorate, professional jobs etc). However, I am not truly middle class, I don't think.

I'd put my values becoming upper class due to my school and uni but have just realised my younger half sister (mum's side) never went to grammar school and is very similar to me in outlook - so I think some of it must be down to intelligence as I felt different to most children in my primary school because they knew I would get somewhere academically whereas most of my peers probably didn't get 5 GCSEs.

I am certainly very different to my parents - my mum who has a 2 hour per day job in a school, reads the Daily Star, loves Jeremy Kyle and even contemplating going on there to 'sort out' my sister, is openly racist, never travelled abroad or had any inclination to, in fact has never eaten 'foreign food', lives in a council house, has no qualifications...My dad has held a job down for all his life, hard-working, owns own house, enjoys foreign holidays, obsessed with football, gone to working man's club his whole life...my two half brothers are very chavvy, homophobic, no interest in the arts, culture etc etc....

So my mum would be lower working class if such a thing, my dad working class and may be I'm upper working class, possibly middle class or somewhere in between!

My H also has a degree and professional job but I'd say he is most definitely working class

Hmmm, I think it might change the way those from the classes below you perceive you, but not those above, iyswim.

To answer the original question, I think it's definitely possible to change class within a generation. The child of working-class parents who goes to university, wwork sas a lawyer and marries a doctor's daughter definitely rises up the class ladder; the doctor's daughter who marries a factory worker, lives on a council estate, doesn't work and calls her children Keesha and Kian could drop down it.

I agree with Sophie that it's less to do with income and more about attitude. However, I think it's becoming increasingly difficult to label people, as lives seem to be much more varied than they used to. I guess people just don't 'know their place' any more [[disapprove]]... ?

Mine and OH's parents are definitely working class, but OH thinks we're more like middle class. I'm not convinced. We read the Indy and Grauniad, pay someone to do our ironing and have degrees. But we also shop in Aldi and Primark, as well as House of Fraser (as posh as it gets here!) and drive my Mum's old car.

Maybe the generational thing comes into it, as well. OH's aunt was horrified that we had an ironing lady, and compared it to having servants in the Victorian era. Does she think we're getting 'above ourselves'?

The Harry Enfield character "loadsa money" highlighted most of that - you may be in a financially better position than someone of higher class, but you can't buy class. However I do think there are more blurred class lines between working and middle than there were before. I'm fascinated by this, but wouldn't have a clue where I stood on the social class ladder.

I think by the way the definitions are titled doesn't help the definition either - people aspire to be working or higher class, but not necessarily middle class (unless you count working class turned good ?). As you said, you are more naturally drawn to people of similar upbringings to you, that's obvious, however by applying an obvious lineage to how each group sits in society, gives people certain feelings (subjectively normally) about class and where they sit in class.

Following on from that, I think Clairys correct, it is bollox

I would also say Sir Alan would be more working class and wouldn't be surprised if he described himself as so. Gordon Ramsay though - middle class for sure.

Another example of money not relating to class is a friend of my auntie who is a millionaire - from her husband running a number of small shops over the years. I have met her several times and I chuckled to myself when my auntie was saying how although she's a millionaire, she's so "down to earth and normal and not posh at all" - well, quite. She is probably one of the most 'common' people I've ever met with absolutely no class about her at all. I chuckled as myauntie clearly equated money with class which I certainly don't.

I'm not sure what exotic means but I'd say that can be the case but more so in the UK than in other countries in my experience.

I agree with those who have said that's it's not a money thing, it's all about attitudes and ways of thinking.

I have no idea what I would be. Also where do policemen come into this class thing, are they working class? I know when my mum was doing some market research there was a long list of professions and classes they would fit into. Actually I think I'm not in any class...or I'm in a class of my own ?

I find this an impossible subject. There's such a mixture of backgrounds, education, abilities and people have relationships with people from other backgrounds, education etc nowadays. It's not like people live by the 'know your station' Victorian ideals anymore which would produce a clearly defined class structure so the old rules don't apply, which is all to the good.

I think, today it's all about perception and the value that some people (and I think it's usually from the outside, looking in unless you're a Hyacinth type) put on qualifications, the material possessions and income but even with these catagories, education is free and available to everyone, material possessions can be bought on the never never by most people and income is only as good as someone is prepared to pay you and for only as long as someone is prepared to pay you unless you have a residual income that you alone control. So I think it's all a big myth these days when you use the usual catagories. (Though, with education, higher ed is becoming expensive so in the future, or even now by some, this might be used as a measuring stick

Someone mentioned attitudes and I find this interesting:

I had a collegue who considered herself a proud, strongly working class person from a working class background. She was a qualified professional and now works in a local university as a lecturer. But she didn't think that changed anything. To her mind, she's working class and that's that.

And my mum considers herself to be middle class. (and I think she's a Hyacinth type!) She comes from a working class background, has been a housewife all her life so doesn't earn anything in a career, doesn't have qualifications above O level but because she's not had to work, doesn't see herself as working class. She's also been known to use what I've done in my life as she thinks this improves the perception others might have of her. (I spent 2 1/2 years in a private boarding school. She neglects to say that the government paid for it and they didn't or that I spent 2 1/2 years in a State comp beforehand.) ?

So anyway, unless you have breeding and titles in your immediate ancestory, I think it's all a load of rubbish.

Great post and interested debate!

I have always considered myself middle class with a teacher mother and scientist father, went to private senior school, had annual foreign holidays and parents paid their mortgage off in their 50s, never in any other debt. I now have a good job, annual long haul, skiing & city break holidays, nice car, hope to clear the mortgage in my 40s etc.

But my husband is a panel beater, his mother worked in an office, his father was in the army and although he bought a house before he met me, he was more struggling to pay off the mortgage and is therefore technically working class.

Some other interesting class definitions that I use in my job and are very widely accepted in various data roles - each group includes those retired from that level and receiving a professional or private pension (not state):

A = professionally qualified e.g. doctor, dentist, lawyer, senior business professionals, top level civil servants

B = middle managers in business (usually with degree), principal civil servants, small business owners, teachers

C1 = junior managers in business, all other non-manual jobs

C2 = all skilled manual workers and team leaders

D = all semi-skilled and other manual workers, apprentices, trainees

E = benefit dependent, unemployed

SophieM - I think I agree with you there and that's the crux of my argument - people can fall into working or middle based on their own choices as opposed to their parents.

I think parentage or heritage comes more into it when defining upper or upper middle (not working and middle middle). This is when you don't count money or jobs but how long and how important your family history is and where it relates to the 'great and the good'.