Thursday, June 9, 2011

Middle Class?

By: Ang Anwar


            Have you ever think about your social status? When I was little, there are only two social statuses that were set up in my mind, either someone is poor or rich. Little that I know about the societies, as time goes by, I realized something; our societies are not only divided into the poor and the rich. The societies are categorized into several social statuses. The social statuses start from lower class, middle class and upper class. The most interesting part from these statuses is the middle class. Most people know about lower class, mostly it is for someone who are basically poor and lack of education. Moreover, upper class is for someone who possessed the major of corporate and individual wealth. How about middle class? Who are considering as middle class societies? Let us find out.
            There are some opinions about the definition of middle class. One of the definitions of middle class is a person who owns a house, a car or cars, and there is always food on the plates for his or her family. Moreover, this person has saving in the bank and they have some saving for vacation as well. How interesting it is? Furthermore, middle class has two other categories, one is lower middle class, and the other one is upper middle class. Lower middle class is essentially someone who has occupation such as service workers, these include polices, firefighters, or anyone who has occupation as service workers. Moreover upper middle class is someone like business executives with high incomes and high social prestige. Therefore, where is middle class stand? 


 Thus, middle class is stand between lower middle class and upper middle class. Most people consider them selves as middle class. However, since the societies have difficulties in defining middle class. Consequently, they simplified it, they categorized middle class from someone’s income. If you have $30,000-$90,000 range of your annual income, then societies will place you at middle class. So, is your status in the middle class?

8 comments:

  1. Ang, you did a nice job with your blog. This past week when we had to read about that hierchy of social status, I was also surprised. Isn't it amazing though,..."how sport team players are wealthy and police officers and fire fighters the risk their life LOW MIDDLE CLASS!!!" It's kind of scary to think about this, I persoanlly think.

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  2. Great blog post ! Its funny , how we divide out social classes. When I was in the 7th grade my teacher made a comment similar to what Katherine said , she was appauld that entertainers make more then those who risk their lives or seek to make the world a better place. I guess thats just the world we live in. Only thing I can say is work smarter not harder and go after what you believe it. After all its about what makes you happy , rather than class or imcome. Guess it's true when they say the rich get richer and the poor get poorer !

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  3. nice job Ang. you really make me think a lot abefore write in your blog..... because i have so mcuh thought about it. I also remenber when i was little whenever i saw most of my friends had a new toys i used to wush that i was someone else Daughter because my mom and my dad have 9 kids and i was the little one.. but i never think about hoow many kids my family have to taking care of i was just th8inking about myself and what i want... the reason i told u that ist because the same time i was reading your blog thats was the first thing come on my mind... been poor and have a lot of kids its something that nobody want to live in ... great job again Ang

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  4. This was a great post. I too also grew up thinking that there were only two classes of people. And I would've categorized my family as middle class. But after learning the different tiers that make up the middle class, my categorization changes. And I was surprised to see that police officers and firefighters were considered lower middle class. Their jobs hold such a important status yet when it comes to income that status drops.

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  5. I also grew up believing in the two class system: upper class(the rich) and the lower class (the poor). I knew that my family was not upper class, but we weren't lower class either. However, I have never heard the terms middle class, upper middle class, and lower middle class until I read it in our book. This was a great post that brought the stark contrast between the classes out and clearly defined them. Great job!

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  6. well done Ang, i never think very deeply like all the post students put here. i knew that we there are three types of class. lower class, middle class and upper class. but i never imaging that two type of middles classes. i grow up in a middle class family in India. the area i lived in India mostly middle class, but some people have cars and bike but others dont. my family one of them dont have cars and bikes. i thought that people who have car are rich. now i know why there are two type of middle classes. think post very strike my heart. all my stupid imagination are gone now, thank u buddy

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  7. Division into classes has always existed in our society. It is very difficult to distinguish where one class ends and another begins. I agree with you, Ang Anwar, that "...the societies have difficulties in defining middle class." Sociologists have identified that the upper middle class includes people who have high incomes and high social prestige, also the great importance is their education. People can have a good education but cannot find jobs in their field. Sometimes man with high social prestige (occupation prestige) does not have high income, if he works, for example, an executive enterprise that does not have profit. Another example is a person who works on two jobs with not high income in order to live better (for example has a better car or great exotic vacation). Thus he has income that is admitted to middle class, but his prestige is not good enough. Also I think that very huge gap between income borders for middle class ($30000 and $90000). We have to take into account family income. Because 30,000 per year may be enough for a single person in order that a man belonged to the middle class, but for a person who has a spouse and children this amount would not be enough.
    It is a very sensible blog post, good job!

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  8. I like your post about the middle class. I knew about the three classes the upper, middle, and lower class but, I didn’t know about the lower-middle class and the upper-middle class until I read the book and you blogging about it. I think I grow up in a middle class family but, the way that you say that there are two types of middle class I now think I grow up in a lower-middle class family. At one time I have a restaurant but not sure if that make me a upper or lower middle class.

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