Anecdotal..

British gal is visiting New York. Loves it and makes plenty of friends. She learns that if she has a job offer she can almost certainly get permission to stay. Goes to an employment agency and gets an interview the same day. Hired to a prestigious firm almost immediately. They tell her they love her classy British accent. In the UK she was lower middle class.

edit = silly me. I forgot that 'middle class' means different things.

At home, she would be a barmaid at the local.

In NYC she was a receptionist in a law firm on Madison Avenue.