Do you think you are in the middle class income bracket?

[Kate]

There are some new tax savings on the horizon for middle-class taxpayers, but wll that include you? As usual, it depends upon whether you fall into the right income bracket.

Who exactly counts as the Middle-Class
by Tamara Lytle
Contributor

(Feb. 28) -- Vice President Joe Biden knows what he wants to do to help the middle class, and on Friday he laid out a series of proposals to help them.

But does he -- or anyone -- know what middle class is?

Is it Americans earning less than $250,000 -- who President Obama promised to protect from tax increases?

Is it people making less than $85,000 -- who Biden's Middle Class Task Force would help through several new benefits like tax credits for saving and for child care?

Is it folks earning around the nation's median household income of just over $50,000 a year?

Or is it 72 percent of the country? That's the percentage who told pollsters from the Pew Research Center in 2008 that they considered themselves middle class or lower-middle class?

"Whether they earn $300,000 or $20,000, people think of themselves as middle class," Angela Ledford, political scientist at the College of Saint Rose in Albany, N.Y., told AOL News.

Ron Haskins, author of "Creating an Opportunity Society" and scholar at the Brookings Institution think tank, said taking just the center 20 percent of the country could give you the true middle. That would be households earning just under $40,000 to about $62,000, he said. But most people don't look at it that way.

"Nobody wants to be poor," he said, noting that defining yourself that way carries a stigma of failure. "People want to be rich but they don't want to call themselves that."

Defining the middle class as all but the highest 20 percent and the lowest 20 percent of income would wrap in people with incomes from about $20,000 to $100,000. But $20,000 is below the poverty line for some families -- not exactly a middle-class life.

"Middle class is a value term, not an economic term. There's no objective measure," said Curtis Dubay, senior tax analyst at the Heritage Foundation think tank.

The Pew poll showed that 53 percent of Americans called themselves middle class and another 19 percent identified themselves as lower-middle class. About 40 percent of people earning less than $20,000 still called themselves middle class, as did a third of people making more than $150,000.

For politicians, Haskins points out, it doesn't matter who is middle class -- only who thinks they are.

"The demographic is huge -- and they vote," Haskins said.

Ledford, who is writing about social class and politics, agreed. Politicians have figured it out.

"When you use that rhetoric 'middle class,' everyone thinks you are talking about them," she said. "That's the power of it.

The term "working class" has lost its luster and denotes a lack of success now, she said. And high-earning people, except for the old-money set, shy away from calling themselves upper class. "It signals an elitism most people don't want to cop to."

During the recession, many families are having a harder time clinging to a middle-class lifestyle. The housing bust has been particularly tough on the middle class. A populist streak, which bills itself as the tea party movement, has staged demonstrations across the country and includes many middle-class, and especially lower-middle-class, people.

But recessions actually hit the upper class hard because they get more of their income from sources like business income and capital gains, Dubay said. (They also bounce back higher after a recession.)

The 2008 Pew Research Center poll showed that as the median income has fa llen, the public has gotten discouraged. About 25 percent of those polled said they had stalled in their tracks and another 31 percent said they have fa llen backward in the past five years.

The American tradition of fighting for the average middle-class guy will live on, Haskins said, because the populist appeal resonates with voters.

But that doesn't mean that anyone is going to pin down exactly who those middle-class average Joes are.

"It's basically in the eye of the beholder," Dubay said.

[Lenin]

In 2007, the median annual household income rose 1.3% to $50,233.00 according to the Census Bureau.[4]
The real median earnings of men who worked full time, year-round climbed between 2006 and 2007, from $43,460 to $45,113. For women, the corresponding increase was from $33,437 to $35,102.

I think the median is a good way to define middle. Thus half of men earn less than $45,113 and half of women earn less than $35,102....while half of families cobble along on $50 g's.

So in the United States THAT must represent middle income.

Only 1.93% of families earn that mythical $250,000 of Obama's imaginary "middle class."

Yes, of course the Obama's make many times that amount as do almost all members of Congress.

[discoveredyou]

Lenin

$250k is the upper limit for middle class not median. Given the price rise and the taxes a person earning $75k can hardly get by.

The average income in Newport will be around $100k and I would still call that a middle class.

DU

[Lenin]

Lenin

$250k is the upper limit for middle class not median. Given the price rise and the taxes a person earning $75k can hardly get by.

The average income in Newport will be around $100k and I would still call that a middle class.

DU

If $250,000 is indeed the "upper limit of the middle class" that would mean the UPPER class consists of a mere 1.93% of the population. Of course one can draw arbitrary limits wherever one wants but to divide the economic demographics into 3 groups with any meaning, the upper group HAS to something larger than 2%. Otherwise one is close to defining the MIDDLE CLASS as EVERYBODY who is not homeless....meaningless.

Middle Class USED to have the meaning of pertaining to those who owned their own businesses, clearly not the case these days.

For some semblance of meaning I think that defining the Middle Class as the middle third might be the most useful measure? Anyone have a better idea?

For the record, 52% of the households have an income between $ 25,000 and $ 100,000 while 28% are below $25K and and 17% are above $100K. So maybe that 52% could be called middle income (class being such a dirty word in the United States) but scraping by on $25,001 cannot be easy.


B