What Economic Class are you? - Page 6

[butterfly1976]

We're in the low-income class. I'm a single parent and we've lived on about $10,000 or less for a couple of yrs now. I very seldom receive child support. We live in an older mobile home. It's on 2 acres in the country with big trees and such. Lots of room for my kids to play. It's my parent's land. I did put my own money into it (septic, water, etc.) yrs ago. We're not on food stamps, wic or HUD. But, I would love to have a house one day. I'm only 30 and I'm worried that I'll be 60 yrs old and trying to pay for house. Right now, as my daddy would say, "I couldn't afford to buy a bean sandwich." But in the future I want a house. I just don't want to be "house poor." I could live here forever, but it's my dream to own a regular home.

Our van is 11 yrs old. So far, so good. I know it won't last forever, but I'll keep it as long as it runs. I don't like debt hanging over my head.

We don't have expensive habits except for one, and I've been working on it since the beginning of the yr. Our habit is eating out too much. I've been amazed at how much money we're saved since we've slowed down. I can't remember the last time I bought new clothes. I buy a lot of my books from thrift shops and yard sales.

I have my heart on starting another business this spring. Hopefully that will increase my income. It could be a lot better, but sure could be a lot worse too.

[Sharlla]

Right now we are lower middle class. But soon when we move out to our house and DH becomes a SAHD our income will be cut in half. It will be ok though as we won't be paying rent/mortgage and our monthly bills will only be around $300 a month.

[koru]

i would say we're upper-middle class. we live modestly because i SAH & my husband is a high school teacher but he makes a decent salary, we own 2 cars outright & have no debt. we have less expendable $$$ than many people in our area & our house isn't as upgraded or luxury & we drive used cars but IMO we have more than we need. and....we all know we're filthy rich compared to most of the world, right?

[CeciMami]

definately lower middle class...and even lower now that i've been laid off! february is a month for us to figure out what changes we'll have to make in order for me to stay home since being a SAHM is really growing on me!

[sallyg6]

Middle, middle. Both in income and in tastes, desires, hobbies, etc.

[mightymoo]

I answered this poll ages ago, but the recent post brought it to the top and got me thinking. I answered middle class, but I realized I have no idea what might be considered upper class. Similarly the line between middle and lower isn't particularly clear.

Also, we live beneath our means, or rather really within our means, not up to our eyeballs in debt and are saving for retirement, college, etc. It just made me wonder, is someone upper class if they LIVE like they are middle class, but have a substantial net worth for say retirement, etc are they upper or middle class?

Class doesn't mean what it used to - someone who was lower class could never BE upper class 200 years ago no matter how much money they had, etc. Now a days its more just a current state of monetary existence I think. Just because you are lower class doesn't mean you are a lesser person, or that you'll be lower class forever. Similar, jsut because you are upper class doesn't mean you are any better than me, etc. So then what is it? It seems to me its more about the money you spend than about the money you have, so isn't class about how rich others perceive you?

I don't know I'm just musing.

[Marvelleaux]

Husband is upper middle-class, I am low-class all the way, baby!

I've been working on him for a long time now and think he's starting to come around though .

[LilMama23]

We make just above the poverty line, so I'd say low-income.
But we were both raised in upper middle-class families.

[Kristinmcall]

I'm really not sure where to put us. DH is fresh out of graduate school working at his first "real" job, and he makes a great living. If it weren't for the amount of debt we have, I would definately put us in the upper class category, but so much of that income goes out the door each month to a huge mortgage, student loan payments and credit card payments : . We ended up having to put lots of medical bills on the cc's and a few other unavoidable things. Also, housing prices where we live are OUTRAGEOUS so it's not like our house is extravagant or anything. We do fine and have the things that we need, but money is tight right now and will be untill we pay off some of our credit cards (we've just started a modified version of the snowball method).

[AngelBee]

: Interesting thread...

[Malva]

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html.../index_01.html

Very interesting multimedia tool. When I saw it, I immediately thought of this thread.

[greenegirl]

Wow, that is really interesting. I am about to go to law school. If I put lawyer in as my occupation and education, our current gross income and net worth, we come out in the 91st percentile. If I put in DH's current occupation and education (since he is the high wage earner right now in our family), with the same gross income and net worth, we come out in the 87th percentile. Either way, each answer falls in the top 5th on the thermometers. I voted middle class in this pole, but by the measures on the NYTimes thing, I should probably have voted Upper Class.

[katheek77]

I'd say middle/upper-middle.

DH brings home 3700/month, I work part-time and bring home about 600/month (my job ends this month, though). I have a '99 Contour, he has an '03 Jeep Wrangler (no payments). We don't own a home, b/c DH is Army, and we'll be moving every few years. We have 25,000 in savings/mutualfunds, and another 10,000 in IRA. About 1,500 in DD's 529 right now. Family gets completely free health care (except for a $3 prescription co-pay), and *very* cheap dental. No child care bills. We have no debt. Husband has a high school diploma, I have a B.S of Ed degree, and some Master's work.

[swimswamswum]

We're all over. If you measure our education and job prestige we are among the highest. If you look at how much money we make and our net worth, we are middle to low.

You've got to love graduate school and post-docs!

[boingo82]

Originally Posted by Malva

http://www.nytimes.com/packages/html.../index_01.html

Very interesting multimedia tool. When I saw it, I immediately thought of this thread.

Very interesting! If I put that in, we are solidly middle-class.

[JesseMomme]

What a fun graph; I put in for Dh (since he earns the money) and we got: Occupation: 15th Percentile, Education: 48th percentile, Income: 3rd percentile, Wealth: 25th percentile, Average: 23rd percentile.

Last week I calculated that we are at 30% poverty level for our family size, the gov't "cutoff" (for assistance) is 130% : With those figures, it makes me look back and wonder how we've managed to survive thus far.

[Scribe]

Heh. That thing puts me all over the board to. Middle class in terms of job function and salary, upper class in terms of education, lower class in terms of assets. I think it probably makes more sense when you're a bit older/more established.

[maisiedotes]

I consider us to be middle-class and struggling, but our town report thingie came out a few weeks ago and our income is almost double the average income for our town. Hrmph.

[kijip]

Well, I suppose we are in the middle...but as a poster here stated - we all think we are in the middle.

We have no debt except for a mortgage in a few days when we close on the house we are buying, we make a good living wage and we can afford for my husband to be in school full-time. We do have a cushion of savings, good educations, good saving habits.

[canadiannancy]

I knew we were in the low income category, then I read the wiki and the nyt graph...we are definitely low income. on the grid we are at bottom fifth for all of the above.