[ef4]

I think as you gain more experience and perspective you will look back and realize that you simply weren't upper middle class yet. It's not about income (which is just a point-in-time metric that can change in an instant), it's about assets.

Programmers have a much better shot at establishing this kind of security than most people, because you should be making 2x to 3x median income for your area, which means you can live on 1x median income and invest the rest.

A lot of the people I've worked with as a programmer over the past 14 years have done effectively that, so by now they have a lot of assets. That is what upper middle class security looks like.