"Middle class" in this context refers to the level of their income and standard of living, where "working class" refers to their relationship to production (i.e. industrial wage workers).
But it wasn’t industrial. The work was cognitive not physical. It also wasn’t exactly for wages in the classic sense given that the federal government had holidays, vacation, and so on.
"Working class' is generally identified as a 'trade' job in terms of ATC it was a trade job back then because it did not require much to get the job in terms of experience or education, you were trained to do the specific job and it rarely changed over the course of your career.
I always thought "working class" means you make your living via your labour, regardless of what that labour is.
The difference would be people who make their living by owning things (stock, companies, property) that pay dividends. This is not to say that they don't work hard, but that their income isn't directly tied to their labour.
In this sense, someone can be both lower class (poor) and a part of the owner class. Someone else can be upper class (rich) and working class.
It is industrial work, and industrial work is not purely physical; even working in a modern factory often requires cognitive work. Tire production is a great example, and if you visit a Goodyear factory you will notice a profound lack of Taylorism in the actual work of the employees (of course, not in the processes themselves).
>It also wasn’t exactly for wages in the classic sense given that the federal government had holidays, vacation, and so on.
Wages are typically understood as whatever price is paid to employees for their ability to work[1]; we may be operating under different definitions, though (I studied economics rather than business).
The bearded dude doesn’t have such a great track record. Seemed like some good ideas but they didn’t pan out when they were tried. Not sure why people are still reading him.
Parent should have used e.g. or ex rather than i.e. The not all working class are industrial workers. A good test is if one sells their labor for wages then they are likely working class.
I think you may be (or I may be) confusing "i.e." for "viz."; I intended to use "i.e.", as I was specifically referring to the ATCs as industrial workers.