$350k a year now considered "middle-class".....WHAT?

A couple other things I like about the original article.

In the breakdown for car it says, "Toyota Highlander instead of a Range Rover." Oh, wow, how middle class of you.

And then he mentions you can make $234k as a BART janitor in San Francisco. He cites an article about some guy that loaded up on overtime and quadrupled his salary. He's one of two out of 474 janitors that made over 6-figures. This guy worked (or claimed to work) 2485 hours of overtime and 1421 hours of regular time and took 5 weeks of vacation. Unbelievable!

All of that to be lower-class. If the article is to be believed, it requires $350k per year in San Francisco to be middle-class. So he is lower-class.

FastTruckRunner wrote:

They can't be serious? How come most letsrunner get by on a five figure salary?

You can get by on a 5 figure salary... just not in a middle class lifestyle. In a lower class lifestyle.

DudeBroMan wrote:

actuallly wrote:

Since you, like all of us have a hot wife and income over $250,000 you realize that it doesn't get you so far. We all have that lifestyle so supply < demand.

Real talk bro: my wife and I, collectively, make under $200k.

We are very comfortably middle class where we live.

We own our own home (our only debt being the mortgage), own two cars outright, have three kids, vacation in Florida two weeks a year (spring with her family, fall with my family), took a European vacation last summer, etc.

If we made $350k it would be obnoxious. I wouldn't even want to handle that type of stress.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I make about $750k per year and only have two kids and man it is stressful.

I think the reason many identify with being middle class despite objectively being upper middle class or “higher” is one of insecurity.

And I don’t mean that they are psychologically insecure like some middle schooler.

I mean that they do not feel secure that they could maintain their lifestyle if something went sideways.

I live in a reasonable affordable city (mid 70s cost of living index per link below), have averaged about $320k per year Ofer the last 5 years with swings from $265k to $390k. Only debt is home mortgage of $280k on a $700k house. Have about $150k in cash a fair portion of which will get consumed over the year and then replenished out of bonus money at year end. “Gross net worth” (including value of home without discounting for transaction cost of selling and looking at gross retirement account numbers without accounting for the fact that they are mostly pre tax dollars) is just under $2.0m. Both in our 40s and have kids. No savings for kids’ college.

Despite being in an objectively financially sound place, I don’t feel financially secure. I think about money regularly - I want to have my mortgage paid off in 2-4 years. I want to put money aside for my kids’ educations (my lowest financial priority for various reasons). I would like to make a down payment on my future retirement home so I could enjoy it some. I rarely travel outside of the continental US and would like to do more of that.

Honestly, because of lower incomes in prior years because of the Great Recession and because I’m debt averse (this morning car payments, no student loans and a 15 year mortgage that I now significantly overpay) and max out my retirement savings, I only recently ever felt like I had meaningful truly disposable income. It’s been great over the more recent years, but in earlier years I always felt like I was one problem away from having cash flow concerns,

And certainly wasn’t keeping up with my peers who were probably not saving as much for retirement or who were carrying higher debt levels but also had watch collections and flew first class to Europe for vacation. I also felt that another recession would’ve forced me to sell my house or refinance back into a 30 year mortgage.

That insecurity is the common ground that makes so many prudent people feel like they are middle class despite the variations in their income.

wealth doesn't define me wrote:

Good article.

And i must apologize in that I most certainly do consider myself in the upper middle class category, just not in the upper class. In general terms, upper middle class is a subset of middle class, but i see that in reading a couple of articles, it is it's own class as distinct from middle class. And I see that dsdaddfdff clearly said i was upper middle, a point that i apparently missed.

Another good article that reinforces differing ways of interpreting social class, both objective and subjective, and how very few people place themselves in the upper class or the lower class.

The upper middle class has a lot of issues in common with the middle class but they also have some vast difference. An upper middle class person talking to the middle class of often comes across as way out of touch. When you read the article you will see tons of examples of this type of spending where the OP does optional spending but thinks of it as required.

And the line between rich and upper middle class is also nuanced. Yeah nobody is going to debate if a billionaire is rich or not. But what about the person with only say 10 million? Thats only ~400k/year of income (i.e. same as the top of the upper middle class). It isn't the type of income where you can fly private jets, have a butler, have my congressman on speed dial, and so on. But it is also a level of income that that 99% of the population can't really imagine.

I make less than half of that amount but still rub heads and hob knob with very rich and successful people.

Don't let your salary determine how much class you have. If you present yourself as a good person, with good hygiene and what not, you'll be able to mix it up with people from various social circles.

Once I learned how to properly wipe my bum, I find that more people approach me.

The thing is, you won't know a lot of people's salaries unless they actually told you. You'd be surprised at how many very high-salaried people carry themselves like sloths and come across as being "lower class". Because they have a lot of money but not a lot of sense or life experience.

Having style and being in a certain class of people is not the same thing.

And it's probably a fair assessment that white Americans are the worst dressed people on the planet.

I can relate to this. We are younger (34/35) with the same NW (2M including house) and a slightly higher income (500k/300k=800k) and are objectively financially secure but are not wealthy yet by any measure. We still think about things like when we can retire, how much our kids college is going to cost etc. and would be set back if one of us lost our job.

I understand we are upper class but there is a big difference between high NW and high salary but still in the wealth accumulation phase. Class isn’t defined by salary, it is defined by assets and this thread seems to be missing that.

....the article is just predicting how much it would take if either Warren or Sanders were to win. With the programs they're proposing, I imagine that $350K gross, reduced by the 75% tax brackets needed to fund their programs, would leave only enough for a middle-class lifestyle.....