It's so hard to think about class in the United States

[firecat]

snippy posted about an interactive feature on CNN.com that attempts to determine whether you, a person residing in the US, can correctly identify whether you count as "middle-class."

Here is the gist of the comment I left over at snippy's post:

Income is not a great gauge of class by itself. Net worth matters a LOT.

Have you read The Millionaire Next Door? One of the main themes is that some professionals with high incomes believe that appearing wealthy is an important part of their professional reputation. So they have big houses, expensive cars and clothes, and are deep in debt. Some rich people think it's important to save money, so they have lots of assets but they don't live in fancy houses, drive beat-up cars, etc. (The book is rather simplistic in its judgements but I agree that those patterns exist.)

Those rich folks and professionals might have similar gross incomes. But are they the same class?

They are defining "middle class" where I live as a household income of $68,420—$107,815.

They're counting it as the middle fifth of income, which means they're assuming five classes. One wonders what the results would be like if they took the middle third of income (I suspect the results would be more boring, although I'm sure some people would define themselves as middle class when they aren't in the middle third of income).

Comments

[marahmarie]

OMG, in my economically mixed high school, I went to school with some of those. And because in 9th grade I considered myself a badass, me and my badass best friend would observe how between classes and at lunch the preppy girls would always jump up and down and scream and hug just to greet each other when they'd already seen each other that day just a few hours before.

After a few months of this we were so nauseated and I was so sick of watching them act like - preps - we started imitating them: we'd wait until they gathered but before they began screaming, jumping and hugging, then rush each other screaming, jumping and hugging - I'd usually try to jump right into her arms so she'd have to catch me mid-air - which admittedly, in my Led Zep shirt, acid wash blue jeans, and long, straight, stoner hairstyle had to look and sound completely ridiculous, as she caught me in her blue jeans jacket and studded black leather high heel boots - then we'd turn around and laugh in their direction without making eye contact and they'd just freeze cold and stare because eventually they got the point - that we were cutting them. I made those girls really kind of hate me.

I outgrew my desire to lampoon them between classes within another year or so and was actually looking and dressing - if not acting - more like them than like a badass by the time I finished up with school, but boy, those were some good times, back when I was still mean enough to actually enjoy them. :)

[firecat]

Yeah my "artsy ones" clique picked on some of the preppy ones a lot. Private day school with strict dress code which limited how far away from preppy we could dress. (No T-shirts, collared shirts only. No jeans, only khakis. No sneakers, but docksiders, gum boots, and clogs.)

[marahmarie]

Yeah, making fun of them was one of the few ways I could safely prick that halo they kept around themselves which they honestly seemed to believe set them apart as being "better" than us, somehow. I've always been about making fun of that sort of attitude. On the other hand, I was so sick of our class (as in socioeconomic) class divisions by the end of 9th grade - and had gotten into such deep doo-doo for generally bucking every rule there was by the end of that school year - that I begged my mom to send me to Catholic school - and I wasn't even Catholic; she was - just to get into a school where we all had to dress the same and could not judge nor be judged on appearances alone - at least, so I thought. That became my dream. And I won the battle - mom took me down to the Catholic school I wanted to attend at the end of that school year to sign me up for their fall semester, but it cost too much and they wouldn't let us finance my education so I had to give up my dream of just blending in, for once.

[firecat]

Do you think your life would have turned out different if you'd been able to go to the blender school?

[marahmarie]

Yeah, I do, though I'm not sure for good or bad; maybe I would've hated it and quit, transferred back to regular public high school, or maybe it would've been the best thing for me. Catholic school might've given me more discipline and focus, two things I lack, along with less distraction, one thing I seemingly cannot avoid falling prey to. When I decide I'm determined enough to get something done I just go and do it, there's no problem, but 99% of the time, left to my own devices, nothing is that important. Which of course is sort of an unusual attitude to have. And one I don't like having, but there seems to be a divide between my inertia and my more kinetic focus that I cannot bridge myself most of the time.

Stricter/more focused/less distracted schooling might've made the difference back when I was still in my more formative time (and therefore, might've made me a more successful person now), but I would've missed out on a few good times and key people at non-blender school, and maybe some achievements I managed to pull off later on (like, becoming copy editor of my school paper along with storyboard layout person and opinion article writer was mind-blowing enough to everybody, believe me, since I was like, destined for exactly nothing but failure a few years before that) but maybe I could've done even more at blender school, or maybe I would've done exactly nothing at all. There's no way to know, really, without having been able to just go and get it done.

[firecat]

When I decide I'm determined enough to get something done I just go and do it, there's no problem, but 99% of the time, left to my own devices, nothing is that important.

Hey, give the shared brain back when you're done with it! :D

[marahmarie]

Ha, right? I get that from my mom...she was very focused, methodical, and deliberate, and got all the important things done every day, but was not ambitious enough most of the time to go over and beyond just taking care of those things. Which is exactly how I function (except I'm quicker and more impatient about getting through those things, overall).

It's when there's something else beyond those needs that I have to push for to get it done that my inertia sets in; then everything else in the world becomes more important and can most easily distract me (this is from my dad, who was like "Whoa, squirrel!" personified, he could not keep his mind on anything less than three things at once, and he never wanted to, and he was extremely ambitious and at least moderately successful at what he did, overall).

So you combine those two and you get me and people think I have like, ADD, because of all the combined traits but I don't. Though sometimes I think just treating myself like I do would not hurt, regardless. :)

[firecat]

Yeah, I am not diagnosed with ADD either, but there's a reason I have "attention machine in need of calibration" as part of my user name here.

I think in my case the lack of motivation is partly depression, because when I'm better medicated, the "nothing is that important" part is not so all-encompassing — I'm more likely to find projects I'm interested in.