[MisterOctober]

Funny you should mention it -- my doctor [who earns something like $600k annually] and I discussed this very topic recently; I was talking about "working class" people in a context that obviously excluded individuals like him, and he was like "whoa there buddy, I work my butt off for a living! Just because my productivity is higher than most folks' doesn't mean my perspective as a working-class man should be disregarded."

At first I was incredulous, but then when I reflected on the fact my own [modest, developer] earnings likely seem to [for example] folks working in retail as disproportionately large as my doc's seem to me, and then considered the huge difference in lifeways between my doc and some of my other friends who live entirely on the interest / dividends from financial instruments [i.e., they don't have to go in to work in the morning] , I understood his perspective and now mainly agree with it.

[wahern]

Working class usually implies little to no savings beyond, perhaps, equity in your house. Losing your job means you're several weeks away from couch surfing or living on the street.

In terms of emotional stress this is worlds away from the toil of the middle class, especially someone making $100,000/year or more.

I grew up poor--like, food stamps and having your furniture thrown out on the street during an eviction poor. Being upper middle class as an adult, one thing I do to relieve the stress is keep my "plan B" in mind. I have more than enough savings that if I had to I could buy a double-wide trailer in the sticks, send the kids to public school, buy a bait shop, and get by just fine. That makes a world of difference, but it's not an option available to the working class. If you're working class your only choices are poverty and the status quo.

A software engineer like myself, or a doctor making $600k/year thinking of themselves as working class, kinda blows my mind. It's not like the working class believe that they're the only ones who work hard.

[bluGill]

It wouldn't surprise me at all if this doctor fits working class. In fact I know of poor people who fit that definition of working class even less than some doctors I know.

It is about spending, and a lot of doctors - despite their high incomes - are in debt with no savings - and equity in the house is 5% as anytime it gets more than that they take out a home equity loan for the difference.

Which is why doctors can feel like they are barely making it: with their spending habits it is a good thing their job is in demand.

[wahern]

But a doctor always has options--many, many options. Even a doctor who loses his license has options. Part of being working class is being stuck in wage labor--not absolutely, but nonetheless quite predictably. There's even a special term for doctors, professional class, which describes their prospects independent of their present economic situation.

No matter how much money or wealth one has, one almost always feels like they're stuck in their situation. That's part of the human condition. And expenses rising to meet income is also typical, at least in the U.S. But different classes of people have objectively different sets of options available to them, regardless of whether they appreciate those options or not.

Also, $600k/year is a ton of money. I make half that and carry a mortgage, apartment lease (temporarily, hopefully), partial second apartment lease (mother), and office lease all in San Francisco, in addition to paying down $130k in law school debt, as well as typical family expenses (two young children). To blow through $600k/year this doctor must have some serious issues. I can only assume the doctor's home is several million dollars, so even at 5% equity a double-wide trailer and bait shop should be well within his reach. But, again, regardless, this doctor has unfathomably more options than a typical working class family. (As do I, for that matter.) To compare the situations is borderline obscene.

[bluGill]

The point is a definition of working class was offered that doesn't exclude this doctor even though most people would agree he isn't working class.

[MisterOctober]

^ this is what my original comment aimed to communicate.

Also, to clarify in case he's reading this: I didn't intend to [and don't believe I did] imply that this particular doctor engages in reckless spending, lives beyond his means, is in financial trouble, or etc -- simply that he considers himself working class for the reasons originally noted

[wahern]

We live in a culture that idolizes the working class, and indulges fantasies of the contented blue collar worker--who for at least a brief period in the 20th century could be securely middle class, not merely fleetingly so as in recent history. And as the middle class hollows out, and victim culture internalized across the political spectrum, we're seemingly forced to choose between identifying as those who work (the good guys) or the wealthy (the bad guys).

It's not surprising that relatively wealthy people self-identify as the good guys. But that doesn't mean we should indulge or lend credence to destructive equivocations that put working and wealth in opposition. We already have a catch-all, no-hurt-feelings, ambiguously safe category--middle class.

Anyhow, FWIW, I've been upvoting both of you because I [feel like I] appreciate what you're saying. I'm mostly objecting to the doctor's sentiments, and the notion that we should sympathize with them. The sentiments are self-serving and socially destructive. That doesn't make him a bad person, but I feel like the sentiments should be called out for what they are.

This is the problem with the check-your-privilege movement. If disempowered groups think they can shame the empowered into giving up power, they're seriously deluded. What will happen--what is happening--is that the wealthy and powerful will self-identify as the disempowered. So I'm not saying that this doctor should "check his privilege", so to speak, but neither should he be doing the exact opposite by willfully denying his privileges. And that's why I say such sentiments are destructive. With privilege comes responsibility; if you can deny the privilege you can shirk the responsibility, such as a civic mindedness that emphasizes constructive cooperation across all groups, and particularly the financial and political participation of those with financial means. If everybody thinks they're not wealthy enough, that it's only the other guy that should pay more taxes, etc, well then we know exactly where that road leads. We shouldn't vilify or shame the privileged (the notion that we can shame people into civility is preposterous), but neither should we condone the privileged pretending that they're not. Those are two sides of the same coin.

[Retric]

Few doctors make 600k, remove malpractice insurance and ~150-300k is fairly common depending on area etc. Remove student loans and a surprising number of doctors are making less than 100k.

https://www.thestreet.com/personal-finance/how-much-do-docto...

[MisterOctober]

Sure that doesn't account for malpractice insurance, etc -- area of specialty also has a large influence on doc earnings potential -- edit : my example is one particular real-world doctor, not necessarily representative of any particular statistical cohort