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What does the social power heirarchy in the United States look like? What are the different classes? (lemmy.world)
submitted 1 year ago by [B] to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world
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[–] 35 points 1 year ago* (8 children)

The real rich (don't have to work)

The rich (earn lots of money, have enough assets to coast of needed)

The poor (anyone who already is, or would end up on the street if they stopped working for a couple years.)

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  • [–] 34 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    The poor (anyone who already is, or would end up on the street if they stopped working for a couple years.)

    I'm hoping you mean "weeks" here rather than "years". Anyone who could just stop working for a few years without becoming homeless, I would classify as rich.

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  • [–] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    This is actually an indication of how bad it really is.

    Compared with someone who really is part of the elite, everyone who isn’t a millionaire is bottom of the ladder. You can own properties and go on global vacations and still be part of the poor class

    If you would take the total estimation of combined US citizen owned money and redistributed evenly per household then every single US household would have over a million.

    There is a common fear that socialism and redistribution of wealth implies you will end with less because most people believe they are better off then the majority and don't want to share, just think about how twisted the people that propaganda comes from must be if a theoretical million is perceived as losing.

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  • [–] 4 points 1 year ago* (2 children)

    I think there's a small middle class who could survive without working for a year or so, but wouldn't really be able to live well. Probably mostly just lower level tech workers and so on. Although if they moved to really poor areas in the US they could probably be classified as rich so YMMV I guess.

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  • [–] 6 points 1 year ago

    There's also the indentured servants. Skilled/ educated workers that live a comfortable life and have their own home, but if they stop working they'll lose their house and have to tap into retirement savings, which will basically make them poor within 10 years. I'm in that group. Under 45, over half a mil in my retirement fund and about 160k liquid, still have 95k left on my mortgage with a rate below 4%. Kids are all under 10, and have at least 150k in their trust fund.

    Theoretically I'm well off... But if I lose my main stream of income, things will cascade quickly.

    I fucking despise Trump, but most of his actual voters are in my social caste... If not just poor and uneducated

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  • [–] 0 points 1 year ago*

    I wish. In reality the rich have pit us at the bottom against eachother.

    You have:
    White collar
    Blue collar
    Factory workers
    Fast food workers
    Poor people
    Disabled
    Drug addicts
    Homeless

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