[Closed] Apparently I'm "Established Middle Class"

'm sure it just because our house is worth over £500k

That's why location matters. 500k around here buys you a [url= http://www.yellowproperty.com/buy-a-property/search/HedleyontheHill-25642436 ]Four bedroom, three reception room, barn conversion featuring extensive gardens, an integral double garage, an external triple garage, and a "fabulous Gin-Gan"[/url]

500k in London buys a cupboard with en-suite kitchen, toilet and living room. 😀

[i]To me the distinction was always:
Working class - you have spare time and you do some more work in it to raise a bit more money.
Middle class - you've enough money to spend a considerable portion on your free time (mountain bikes) and you might even do some voluntary work or work in a job you like rather than the best you could get,
Anything higher you've got more money than you spend, so you spend more than necessary on your free time (owning a brace of high end shotguns rather than having once been clay pigeon shooting on a middle class stag do). [/i]

IMO class has nothing to do with money, at least it isn't linked to what YOU earn.

Precariat
This is the poorest and most deprived class group.

And I thought I was a bit posh.....I even read the Guardian ffs.

Still, I might be poor and deprived, but at least I'm happy.

Well at least you've that nucleus to build a future around

500k around here buys you - a hell of a lot of cheap pine by the looks of it and decor from the 80's.

Elite here for what it's worth, but not over surprised by that result really.

a hell of a lot of cheap pine by the looks of it and decor from the 80's.

Well I didn't say it was tasteful 😀

Those beams are quite nice though.

[img] [/img]

I had our Butler do the test for us.
I am glad to report that the result came back as [b]ELITE[/b] ,phew.
Must dash,we are off to test our new hovercraft at North Queensferry.

The tiles are from Fired Earth (79p per tile).

Cheapskate!

IMO class has nothing to do with money, at least it isn't linked to what YOU earn.

I think I actually said is specifically wasn't if you read it, if you're middle to upper class you're more likely to be doing some voluntary work and your kids are off on a gap-yaaa. At the other end of the scale though it's hard to see a justification for a "working class" label if you don't have to work.

Emergent service workers

This class group is financially insecure, scoring low for savings and house value, but high for social and cultural factors. According to the Great British Class Survey results, lots of people in this group:

Although when we buy a house next year we'll be established middle class (despite a love of Hip-Hop and dislike of more 'classical' cultural things).

The thing that surprises me is that even now at the end of 2015 after 8 years of financial upheaval, and based on nothing but a few questions you're considered to be financial secure because you've got a mortgage and insecure if you don't despite all factors pointing towards the opposite - at the moment our rent is 11% of our income, we can easily afford to pay all our bills on one income, in the unlikely event our nearly-new boiler breaks down (or anything else in the house) we've got a 24 hour SLA with the maintenance people to at least get someone to look at it and that's 24/7/365 we'll never see a bill for any of it. We've also got effectively a 'rest of our lives' lease and rent is tied to inflation. Whilst we don't have much in the way of savings (as per that link anyway) we do both have very good pensions. I'm not sure it's possible to be more financial secure without a huge pile of money in the bank.

By the end of next year we will likely have bought a house, our mortgage will probably be double what we're paying now and at the whim of the BOE, our savings will be gone, and if anything breaks in the house we'll have to pay for it ourselves - for the first 12 months at the very least - if something major goes we'll have to use a credit card to pay for it. With massive large scale house building projects already started near us and more nationally coming in the years to come, coupled with rising interest rates it's by no means guaranteed the value of it will rise - it may even fall. in 25 years, just about when I'm starting to think about retiring it will (all things being well) be paid for, and whilst it might be worth a huge pile of money, it's money I can actually use unless I somehow work out how to live somewhere for free, the true value to us is that we won't have to pay a mortgage / rent from our pension.

But hey, financially security!

This is exactly the sort of thing that illustrates how stupid the term "middle class" is, it doesn't mean anything tangible - it only exists to make people think they're a bit superior. but mostly it allows those who are actually rich, convince the rest of us we're wealthy really and should vote as such.

Traditional working class

Hmm, I've had a play with selecting different things in the wealth bit, and not only is it heavily dependent on how expensive a house you own (ie how long ago you bought, which part of the country you live in), it's not internally consistent. Given current circumstances I'm Technical Middle Class. If we sold the house and rented for a while I become Emergent Service Worker. Then if we bought a slightly cheaper house (which could even just be relocating somewhere cheaper and buying just as big a house) converting some of the equity into savings we become Elite!

TMC - prob about right, though from WC family

If you need to take a test to tell you you're middle class.

You're not middle class!

On the contrary, if you're browsing the web doing tests, then you're middle class whatever the results say.

On the contrary, if you're browsing the web doing tests, then you're middle class whatever the results say.

Not necessarily. I'm doing the test on an iPhone I've just mugged someone for (they had it open on it at the time), then I'm off to spend the proceeds on smack

How did you all value your savings, which includes pension? That made the difference between technical middle class and elite for me.

Ah, completely forgot to include the pension. If I include how much it would cost to buy the equivalent of my DB pension then I'm elite even without downsizing.

Elite here too, although more accurately my missus is elite, and I just tag along.

So, a test that confirms people really did get idea's above their station. The game was to get people to believe they are middle class, once they think that way, they start voting that way and, oh dear.

Where I live there are plenty of people who would fit into that tests version of what middle class is, but they have large mortgages, the cars on credit, the kids don't go to fee paying schools.

The people up on the hill are middle class, never concerned about the cost of housing, the cost of the schools their kids go to, or their childrens future because the family wealth gets passed on, how many holidays they go on every year, etc, etc.

Peoples jobs may have changed from blue collar to white collar, and they are not "working class" anymore, but they are not middle class, that class definition takes a whole lot longer to acquire.

Well, that macaroni cheese slice has just re-established my cultural identity. Might go for a sit down piss to sleep it off.

[quote=El-bent ]Where I live there are plenty of people who would fit into that tests version of what middle class is, but they have large mortgages, the cars on credit, the kids don't go to fee paying schools.
...
Peoples jobs may have changed from blue collar to white collar, and they are not "working class" anymore, but they are not middle class, that class definition takes a whole lot longer to acquire.

I'm not sure you understand the concept of middle class. Large mortgages and cars on credit are very middle class things , and sending the kids to private school certainly isn't a requirement (I've discovered I'm a member of the elite and certainly can't afford that, though I do have the upper middle class credentials of a lack of credit).

Those people up on the hill sound upper class, or at the least upper middle class (since upper class still implies spurious things about hereditary titles)

's all about Tomato Sauce innit?

Keep yer red sauce in the cupboard? You're working class.
Store your Tomato Ketchup in the Fridge as per the instructions on the bottle? You're middle class.
Absolutely no idea where Cook keeps the pickles and preserves? You're upper class.

Anyone else here in the working class scum category?

😉

Anyone else here in the working class scum category?

Matt, you're only working class [b]scum[/b] if you keep your red sauce in the living room next to your 60" telly

GrahamS - Member

'm sure it just because our house is worth over £500k

That's why location matters. 500k around here buys you a Four bedroom, three reception room, barn conversion featuring extensive gardens, an integral double garage, an external triple garage, and a "fabulous Gin-Gan"

500k in London buys a cupboard with en-suite kitchen, toilet and living room

You're not that far from the truth - leafy London suburbs here - £500k gets you an extended bungalow (now 4 bed) with a detached garage and off street parking...

matt_outandabout - Member
Anyone else here in the working class scum category?

I'm authentic working class scum with overdeveloped and unaffordable aesthetic sensibilities

😀

I'm authentic working class (father was a tradesman, which I think is teh definition). Elite apparently. Socialising with a mix of people at the cycle club and the odd theatre trip keeps one's standing.

I've got evidence you're all uneducated unwashed plebs - none of you got my cellular biology joke 🙁

Established Middle Class, presumably because I enjoy both Mobb Deep and Billie Holiday and I don't rent.

Well I just completely PSML as it says I'm elite, despite being a copper born in an old Yorkshire mill town, and with Cypress hill top of my play list....

Emergent service worker apparently. Going back and saying I owned a house instantly propelled me into the Established middle class though. Like P-jay I'm not convinced that's a useful marker,

But I look more like the guy in the Emergent service worker graphic.

Hmm, Elite, I think the calculator is broken.

Load of bollocks, if you work for a living and don't sit on your ass living off other people's labour then your working class. Claiming to be middle class is working class denial and a salary is a simple method for getting middle class people to work longer for free, see I went all left wing for a moment

I'm a Precariat. Which I though was some sort of desert cat, but whatever.

Surely unless you can survive off the return from your investments/estate you're working class.

Elite, apparently. 😕

Hmm, Elite, I think the calculator is broken.

if you work for a living and don't sit on your ass living off other people's labour then your working class

Hmmm my "labour" largely involves sitting on my ass, occasionally prodding at a PC.

Does that make me working class? I'm not exactly down't pit.

There are no pits anymore, prodding PCs is the new coal face

Flawed from the outset - the elite would never descend to such a vulgar exercise 😉

Besides, it seems mostly based on income and home ownership - I listen to classical music and go to museums 😉

[quote=teamhurtmore ]Flawed from the outset - the elite would never descend to such a vulgar exercise

What did you score?

Ok, lets settle this once and for all....

who watched the Turner Prize on channel 4 last night then?

😉

I'm a Precariat. Which I though was some sort of dessert cat

A cat that you can eat? I tend to stay away from meat, but for next door's moggie I would make an exception.

some sort of dessert cat

a puddy tat?