this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2025
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No Stupid Questions

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As in: Which makes the most sense from their PoV, ethics aside.

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[–] chiliedogg@lemmy.world 21 points 4 days ago

Middle class is a fabrication designed to make the working poor think they're better off than they really are.

[–] K1nsey6@lemmy.world 35 points 4 days ago

There is no middle class, there is only working class and the parasitic class.

[–] OboTheHobo@ttrpg.network 25 points 4 days ago

The middle class still works to make a living. So they are part of the working class.

[–] favoredponcho@lemmy.zip 15 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Everyone that sells their time to make a living is part of the same class. Everyone that makes their money through appreciation of capital is a different class.

[–] __siru__@discuss.tchncs.de 1 points 10 hours ago

This, lets not forget that there used to be poor aristocrats. The amount of assets you have does not necessarily define your class, but rather how you are forced to spend your life time.

[–] A_Union_of_Kobolds@lemmy.world 90 points 5 days ago (2 children)

The "middle class" is just the working class with debt. In class struggle terms, its not "rich vs poor", it's "owners vs workers". If you have to work to support yourself, that tells you all you need to know.

[–] scarabic@lemmy.world 2 points 3 days ago

That’s a really good way of putting it. We have the wealthy, the poor, and the poor who’ve been given scraps by the wealthy and are complicit in protecting them. The “middle class” believe they can gain more in scraps than they can by revolution. And so it continues.

[–] DeathByBigSad@sh.itjust.works 17 points 5 days ago (12 children)

I have relatives that own their house as well as a few rental properties, but they also work normal jobs, they get the new iPhone (or sometimes Samsung Phone) every year, they rarely use public transit, always drive their cars. I'm assuming they have health insurance as well. And I also heard they have other investments besides rental income (as in stocks)

Now I don't know if they need to work, but they definitely have enough rental income to get by even if they lose their jobs.

Idk what class that is supposed to be.

[–] A_Union_of_Kobolds@lemmy.world 35 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Does it matter? These are just concepts. Marxists would tell you theyre petit-bourgeoisie. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Petite_bourgeoisie

Ultimately, supporting the working class helps everyone.

[–] garbagebagel@lemmy.world 23 points 5 days ago (6 children)

I think an easier interpretation than the "owners vs workers" in this day and age is, are they billionaires. If you're not a billionaire or close to it, you should be on the side of the working class.

The billionaires that make up only 1% of the population ans own nearly half the wealth of the entire world are the problem.

[–] Bubbaonthebeach@lemmy.ca 8 points 5 days ago

$10M and up would probably qualify. Below that, people would still need to work to maintain what they have with some measure of comfort and dealing with risk, inflation. Above that, they should be able to be self sustaining without working for a paycheque.

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 9 points 5 days ago (1 children)

You don't need to be a billionaire.. 10 million plus is sufficient to never have to work again if you are not absolute degenerate and know how to manage money.

100 million if you have to cosplay being "rich"

[–] blarghly@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

1 million is commonly agreed upon in the FIRE community as the number to hit to have a confortable retirement in perpetuity. Following the 4% rule, you could withdrawal $40k each year to live off of and would almost certainly not run out of money before you die, even accounting for inflation.

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 4 points 4 days ago (8 children)

That number doesn't math... Unless you also have a paid off house.

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[–] prole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Sounds to me like petite bourgeoise. Wannabe owner class

[–] jcr@jlai.lu 2 points 3 days ago

"they have health insurance". It is a given in quite a few countries. No link to being wealthy. Driving your car is not about being wealthy, dependant low wage workers have to drive to go to the factory too.

The stability of the owner class comes from the lack of necessity to labour to have spending money. You can be a wage worker like Emmanuel Macron, president of France with a current wage of net 8k€ ; but he just sold his wife inherited house for 3m€, when they got it for 1m€ (1.5m after the tax bureau caught him for under-valuating it). This is not working class.

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[–] plz1@lemmy.world 52 points 5 days ago

The middle class isn't real. You are either working class or owner class. Anything else is just there to divide the working class in a forever class war with the owner class.

[–] jerkface@lemmy.ca 3 points 3 days ago

"Middle class" is a social class (like "upper class" and "lower class"), not an economic class (like "working class" and "ruling class").

If you think having a nice car makes you closer to the ruling class than the working class, you've internalized the mind control and it doesn't matter what you pick, you're a threat.

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 7 points 4 days ago

People who have to work a job to live are workers.

Every other abled bodied person who lives without contributing doesn't need to be around.

[–] TheAlbatross@lemmy.blahaj.zone 26 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

The middle class is a fabrication. It's an income bracket created by capitalism, not a true analysis of one's association to the means of production and labor. It's "real" in the sense that many people identify themselves to it, but it's not real in a Marxist sense.

A vast majority of people in the middle class are the proletariat. Some of the people in the middle class are petite bourgeois.

Edit: I think your question is a good one, simply because so many people do see themselves as part of this Middle Class first before they think of themselves as workers or business owners, but I think that's a sign of effective capitalist propaganda meant to distract the workers from their relationship to labor. The Middle Class largely is made up of people who need to be reeducated to understand that they are part of the proletariat and the bourgeois have been robbing them for centuries.

[–] Bronzebeard@lemmy.zip 3 points 3 days ago

Look at a graph of wealth distribution. The difference between any two points in the lower 99% is barely noticable, when compared to what the top 1 and even .001% have access to.

[–] RBWells@lemmy.world 21 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

The lower classes, because "real" capitalism grows from the bottom and trickle down is discredited nonsense, and we work so are working class too. There is no benefit to supporting those who don't need it. Buying from small local shops and employee owned outfits, and if you are a business owner, paying well and giving employees ownership stake and profit sharing, that at least moves the needle in the right direction.

AFA self interest, middle class has more to gain by the poor becoming middle class, than by the rich getting richer.

[–] threeonefour@piefed.ca 17 points 5 days ago (1 children)

In the book 1984, one of the characters postulates that in any system of government there are 3 groups. The unwashed masses comprising 90% of people, the elite who are better than everyone else making up 1% of people, and a middle buffer of 9% of people. The buffer is used by the elite to keep the unwashed masses from uprising. Anyone from the 90% who looks like they might be trouble for the 1% gets to be in the 9%. They get treated a bit better in exchange for defending the status quo. Perhaps if they defend it hard enough they can be given a spot among the 1%!

I believe the argument made by this character is supposed to be flawed, but it ends up being pretty believable. The "middle class" would be the buffer zone of people who defend the status quo in exchange for slightly better treatment by the 1% than the average person gets.

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[–] maxwells_daemon@lemmy.world 17 points 5 days ago

The 1% richest hold 50% of all the wealth. If we're being reasonable, everyone vs them is probably more than enough.

[–] njm1314@lemmy.world 6 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It depends, how do they feel about guillotines?

[–] Pappabosley@lemmy.world 4 points 4 days ago

This has always been my thought. As someone who is living a comfortable life, some would consider me as well-off or rich. Regardless, I am not private security rich, so would be an easy target at the start of the uprising.

Hence, ethics aside, it's in my best interest to keep the 'workers' happy.

[–] Rhynoplaz@lemmy.world 14 points 5 days ago (5 children)

The middle class is nothing more than poor people who are convinced that they'll be rich someday.

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[–] jasoman@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago

If you don't know, you don't have enough rich friends.

[–] memfree@piefed.social 8 points 5 days ago

You can't put ethics aside. All we have is ethics. Ideally, ethics get codified into laws against doing unethical things, but not forcing people to only and always do that which someone said is ethical (no drunk driving, but no banning on alcohol). Problems crop up when the laws are unethical -- like saying corporations are people or landmines aren't warcrimes.

[–] birdwing@lemmy.blahaj.zone 7 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

The workers, 100%.

The difference between even a millionnaire and a billionnaire is one billion.

It's such a large gap that in my view, no one really could claim to be a "temporarily embarassed billionnaire". Nobody is; there are only workers and there are oligarches.

[–] NoneOfUrBusiness@fedia.io 4 points 5 days ago

Setting aside the "the middle class isn't real" point, distributing the rich's wealth for the benefit of everyone else is the sales pitch of socialism, so the middle class is still on the side gaining from a successful proletarian class struggle. I mean, the bourgeoisie winning means the status quo with its permanently declining quality of life, so I don't think many middle class people are too thrilled about continuing with that.

[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 3 points 5 days ago

As wealth inequality increases the line for who matters at the top gets smaller. At this point the top 1% controls 50% globally so on a global scale if your not in that 1% you don't matter. But like in the us its 2% so that is what it takes to be in the in crowd. In europe its 10% to be in. As wealth inequality gets worse those who previously benefited from slanted playing fields will find they fell down to the bad side of the board and they will be a major source of sucking for the top to increase their wealth expansion.

[–] sunzu2@thebrainbin.org 3 points 5 days ago

Middle class is a fiction of post ww2 westoid regimes.

They are just a deluded working class who forgot where they came from.

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