Understanding the state of the middle class is important on a philosophical level. Many believe the stability and success of the middle class determines the future and current strength of a nation. The middle class has been essential in the power of Rome, the reinvention of Europe during the renaissance, bringing about the American Revolution, French Revolution, Marxist revolution, and numerous other broad and dramatic social events.
But defining the middle class so it can be measured and analyzed is a controversial issue.
Wikipedia has a good introduction to the fuzzy ideas that surrounds what we call "middle class", particularly from the French tradition of the "bourgeois", which has its root word meaning town dwellers. There are many contradictory ideas from various social and political backgrounds that Wikipedia tries to fuse together.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Middle_classhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_middle_classWikipedia comes up with several criteria that one might conceivably use to measure who is and is not in the middle class:
- Achievement of tertiary education.
- Holding professional qualifications, including academics, lawyers, chartered engineers, politicians, and doctors, regardless of leisure or wealth.
- Belief in bourgeois values, such as high rates of house ownership and jobs which are perceived to be secure.
- Lifestyle. In the United Kingdom, social status has historically been linked less directly to wealth than in the United States,[4] and has also been judged by signifiers such as accent, manners, place of education, occupation, and the class of a person's family, circle of friends and acquaintances.
- Cultural identification. Often in the United States, the middle class are the most eager participants in pop culture whereas the reverse is true in Britain.[7] The second generation of new immigrants will often enthusiastically forsake their traditional folk culture as a sign of having arrived in the middle class.
But I think this list is either incomplete or incorrect for the US and western civ. For example, I would consider a person with a self made business without college degree, without professional certification, and without family and home to be a part of the middle class. To miss the majority or all of these bullet points but still able to be a part of the middle class in a vague sense seems to indicate that the definition provided by Wikipedia doesn't really work.
Others will define middle class (for the US) strictly by income. They will say, 0-25k/y is poor. 25-40k/yr is working poor, 40-100k is middle, 100k-300k is upper middle, and 300k+ is rich. This divides income is in a nice bell curve of fifths. And for other nations, they would extend this idea of dividing income by fifths as the starting point for analysis.
My criticism of this approach is that the 0 income college student would be misidentified by this 1 dimensional approach. As would my previous example business owner in a single bad year, or anyone else in a transitional period.
My thinking on this issue is that we are missing the dimension of political power.
The poor are in such a weak social and political situation that the rich can take legal and illegal advantage of them with no recourse, and the gov't official can abuse them individually or as a class with no political power to resist. In this line of thought, the serf, indentured servants, sharecroppers, outcasts, and similar are a poor and working poor class who are very vulnerable to abuse.
The middle class are a group that individually does not have political connections or significant influence. But they have enough social connection and unity that they can protect themselves as a class, and have enough wealth to prevent fraudulent abuse by the rich at a minimal level.
The rich by nature have political connection individually as well as enough wealth to protect themselves or direct the influence of gov't in their favor.
I would further add the dimension that these political definitions of class change depending on the region or population being considered.
Consider a bank president of a local town bank. Locally he is well connected to the mayor, city council, or county gov't. Compared to most of the town, he is probably one of the wealthiest guys in the region. If the local deputy or Sheriff ever pulled him over for drunk driving, he would most likely be allowed to get away with it, one way or another. If local zoning laws are in the way of some interest he has, he can get those laws changed. So from a regional point of view, he is of the rich class.
But from a state or multi-state point of view, the small town bank president is insignificant. He shifts from being a well connected wealthy man, to one of the upper middle class. He doesn't have the power to shift State and National laws. And if caught in fraud business by FDIC, SEC or others, he would be nailed to the wall.
There are many more who are wealthy on a multi-state, national and international level, with connections to Presidents, Senators, and lead political powers that can influence enough to avoid those attacks.
I think adding this dimension of political power makes a coherent definition of classes that works in most of western civilization history, from Roman to Germanic barbarism, to Renaissance, to Modern era. And also works in scale, from a very local level to a national level. And finally, works with layman intuition, as shown by the bank president example.
Criticisms?
