Social Class in America: Three Ladder System

[The Brain]

My primary objection is with the idea that there are separate "ladders". That implies that moving from one to another is difficult, if not impossible.

"Ladder" is code for race.

[Valmy]

There's a small underclass and a small upper class.  But a large majority of us are in a big squishy middle (effectively classless), despite all the OMG THE MIDDLE CLASS IS DIEING rhetoric we hear.

Well if we go by that notion almost every modern nation is classless.  I am not certain the notion of class is particularly useful in describing our society but I am not sure it is really classless either.

[derspiess]

but I am not sure it is really classless either.

Not totally.  But I never made that claim.

[Jacob]

WEll, you are certianly right about his agenda. He has some really interesting points though. This bit stuck out to me as being pretty interesting. I don't know if it is correct, but it is certainly interesting:

The relationship between the Gentry and Elite is one of open rivalry, and that between the Gentry and Labor is one of distrust. What about Labor and the Elite? That one is not symmetric. The Elite exploit and despise Labor as a class comprised mostly of "useful idiots". How does Labor see the Elite? They don't. The Elite has managed to convince Labor that the Gentry (who are open about their cultural elitism, while the Elite hides its social and economic elitism) is the actual "liberal elite" responsible for Labor's misery over the past 30 years. In effect, the Elite has constructed an "infinity pool" where the Elite appears to be a hyper-successful extension of Labor, lumping these two disparate ladders into an "us" and placing the Gentry and Underclass into "them".

Yeah, there does seem to be fairly strong currents of anti-intellectualism aimed at the creative and progressive parts of the middle class; there does seem to be a fairly significant strain of anti-elitism as well, and it doesn't seem to be aimed at the actual elites.

Church certainly offers an explanation of the phenomenon; like you I'm not sure he's correct. I mean, you could perhaps site the Koch brothers and Rupert Murdoch as evidence, but I suppose the question is whether they're actually deliberately creating such sentiment (which is what it seems Church argues) or merely guiding something that exists naturally (or for other reasons).

Personally I'd jettison the Evil-E1-Conspiracy part of the classification system. I think that rather than say that E1s secretly control everything for their own (evil) benefit I'd say that the mark of people in the E1 class is that while they can influence major events, the important part is that they're in strong enough position that they can take advantage of the situation pretty much no matter what happens.

[Maximus]

I think alot of Americans define class as in a social hierarchy of orders with legal privileges for each one, a la ancien regime France.  So because we have no dukes, or whatever, we have no class.

Which strikes me as a very narrow definition of class.

I don't think that is it. To me the problem with with trying to define a class system is the discretization of what is actually, for the most part, a continuum.

Yes there are differences and yes where you start affects where you end up, but for the most part it is all one big space.

[merithyn]

There's a small underclass and a small upper class.  But a large majority of us are in a big squishy middle (effectively classless), despite all the OMG THE MIDDLE CLASS IS DIEING rhetoric we hear.

Mmm.. not if you listen to most statistics. There's a pretty good chunk of the population that are below povery level. I think it's at around 15% now. That doesn't include those who are just above that level, barely scraping by.

That's a pretty high number, especially compared to recent history. The Middle Class is shrinking.

[Malthus]

I think alot of Americans define class as in a social hierarchy of orders with legal privileges for each one, a la ancien regime France.  So because we have no dukes, or whatever, we have no class.

Which strikes me as a very narrow definition of class.

My definition of class is something that is at least in part self-perpetuating and easy to define as unlike other classes.

The "underclass" is a good example - once in it, it is hard to get out, your kids will most likely be underclass too, and it is (reasonably) easy to define what it is. Similarly, the ultra-elite - barring exceptional circumstances it is very hard to get in without being born in it, and it is easy to recognize.

The fear, in North America, is that what used to be a rather more fluid middle is moving to effectively a two-class system - those who are easily employable because of experience, having the exact right education, luck, skill, entreprenureal smarts, or some combo of the above, and earn enough to both fund their kids through education and retire;  and the mass of under-employed and under-paid; and that rising barriers to entry will make this division into truly a "class" division, such that it will take being the kids of someone in the "steadily employable" group to break into it.

[Valmy]

I don't think that is it. To me the problem with with trying to define a class system is the discretization of what is actually, for the most part, a continuum.

Yes there are differences and yes where you start affects where you end up, but for the most part it is all one big space.

Which is why I am not really comfortable with the idea.

I think the concept is more suited to a society with a huge mass of uneducated farm workers and/or industrial laborers with little ability to advance themselves.  But those sorts of societies are becoming more scarce in the modern era.  There are still classes but they are less...erm...classy or something.

[Jacob]

My definition of class is something that is at least in part self-perpetuating and easy to define as unlike other classes.

The "underclass" is a good example - once in it, it is hard to get out, your kids will most likely be underclass too, and it is (reasonably) easy to define what it is. Similarly, the ultra-elite - barring exceptional circumstances it is very hard to get in without being born in it, and it is easy to recognize.

That's not a bad approach, actually

The fear, in North America, is that what used to be a rather more fluid middle is moving to effectively a two-class system - those who are easily employable because of experience, having the exact right education, luck, skill, entreprenureal smarts, or some combo of the above, and earn enough to both fund their kids through education and retire;  and the mass of under-employed and under-paid; and that rising barriers to entry will make this division into truly a "class" division, such that it will take being the kids of someone in the "steadily employable" group to break into it.

I think that's pretty perceptive as well.

It does leave out one thing that Church outlined and which resonated with me as well. One of the keys, I thought, of the ladder system was that of values.

For the labour ladder the notion of success was tied to and derived from doing more work, basically. If you recall, he posited the pinnacle of the labour ladder to be someone who's running a successful plumbing business or restaurant or series of same. He's the guy who learned to be a plumber, worked hard, was smart, and now he's got a large plumbing business that services the whole state or whatever.

Contrast that to the pinnacle of success he posits for his gentry class - Jon Stewart (or Rush Limbaugh, to pick someone on the other side of the political spectrum); there the ideal is to generate value from ideas, advancement, and/or culture.

Finally the pinnacle of the Elite class is to exercise control, where the specifics of what is being controlled is less germane than the control itself.

I think the tension between these different value values (ahem) describe and explain a lot of the conflicts we see across the American landscape (and elsewhere as well), and I think that's interesting. Perhaps it's a mistake to attach them to class definitions though...

[Malthus]

My definition of class is something that is at least in part self-perpetuating and easy to define as unlike other classes.

The "underclass" is a good example - once in it, it is hard to get out, your kids will most likely be underclass too, and it is (reasonably) easy to define what it is. Similarly, the ultra-elite - barring exceptional circumstances it is very hard to get in without being born in it, and it is easy to recognize.

That's not a bad approach, actually

The fear, in North America, is that what used to be a rather more fluid middle is moving to effectively a two-class system - those who are easily employable because of experience, having the exact right education, luck, skill, entreprenureal smarts, or some combo of the above, and earn enough to both fund their kids through education and retire;  and the mass of under-employed and under-paid; and that rising barriers to entry will make this division into truly a "class" division, such that it will take being the kids of someone in the "steadily employable" group to break into it.

I think that's pretty perceptive as well.

It does leave out one thing that Church outlined and which resonated with me as well. One of the keys, I thought, of the ladder system was that of values.

For the labour ladder the notion of success was tied to and derived from doing more work, basically. If you recall, he posited the pinnacle of the labour ladder to be someone who's running a successful plumbing business or restaurant or series of same. He's the guy who learned to be a plumber, worked hard, was smart, and now he's got a large plumbing business that services the whole state or whatever.

Contrast that to the pinnacle of success he posits for his gentry class - Jon Stewart (or Rush Limbaugh, to pick someone on the other side of the political spectrum); there the ideal is to generate value from ideas, advancement, and/or culture.

Finally the pinnacle of the Elite class is to exercise control, where the specifics of what is being controlled is less germane than the control itself.

I think the tension between these different value values (ahem) describe and explain a lot of the conflicts we see across the American landscape (and elsewhere as well), and I think that's interesting. Perhaps it's a mistake to attach them to class definitions though...

I don't think those values work well with class definitions ... taking again what I'm familiar with, that would put most lawyers quite firmly in the "labour" class, as lawyers are notrious for being chained to the concept of the "billable hour" - i.e., success is derived, literally, from volume of work.

[derspiess]

Mmm.. not if you listen to most statistics. There's a pretty good chunk of the population that are below povery level. I think it's at around 15% now. That doesn't include those who are just above that level, barely scraping by.

That's a pretty high number, especially compared to recent history. The Middle Class is shrinking.

Meh, sounds like scaremongering-- poverty is a relative concept and if you're gonna do the poverty thing, the US is a pretty good place to do it.  There's still a good deal of mobility up or down.  I don't think most of us think of ourselves as being of a particular class, other than that squishy middle.

Americans just aren't particularly class-conscious, save for the snobby elites and the resentful self-defeating underclass.

[Jacob]

Americans just aren't particularly class-conscious, save for the snobby elites and the resentful self-defeating underclass.

I think I have a pretty good idea whom you mean by the resentful self-defeating underclass... but who do you mean when you say snobby elites?

[derspiess]

Americans just aren't particularly class-conscious, save for the snobby elites and the resentful self-defeating underclass.

I think I have a pretty good idea whom you mean by the resentful self-defeating underclass...

No, you probably don't, Seedy.

but who do you mean when you say snobby elites?

Those with extreme generational wealth.  I have to admit I don't know them very well.

[crazy canuck]

Do you think the rest of his classification system falls down too, or is it a potentially useful framework for analysis once adjusted to be more accurate (and filter out bias)?

I dont think his classification system is useful.  He has an interesting idea regarding educated bright people being a new class but I think his analogy to the old land based gentry who needed to do nothing more than get born into the right family fails on a martiesque scale.

[Berkut]

There's a small underclass and a small upper class.  But a large majority of us are in a big squishy middle (effectively classless), despite all the OMG THE MIDDLE CLASS IS DIEING rhetoric we hear.

Mmm.. not if you listen to most statistics. There's a pretty good chunk of the population that are below povery level. I think it's at around 15% now. That doesn't include those who are just above that level, barely scraping by.

That's a pretty high number, especially compared to recent history. The Middle Class is shrinking.

I think there is a very, very large difference between the poor and the underclass that you are missing.

The poor might be poor, but their social class and culture allow them to have a reasonable shot of becoming not poor, and it isn't generational. Their kids might be poor, but might not, and have a pretty decent opportunity to become not poor if they have a reasonable amount of intelligence/ambition/hard work, etc.,

Being poor sucks, but it isn't any kind of permanent sentence.

The underclass in America are the poor who for a variety of reasons are generational poor. They are poor, and quite likely their kids will be poor as well, because their social "class" is one that lacks the very things that give mobility to other poor Americans. Familial stability, appreciation for and access to education, etc., etc.