I can't speak to the other indexes but Food Insecurity is absolutely measureable and it has nothing to do with perception of need. It's pretty much defined as when a household lives in hunger or fear of starvation.

There is an entire industry based around collecting, assessing, and quantifying this data.

Very true. The most revealing stat on that is the prison population numbers. We have WAY too many people behind bars, which means we do a terrible job a) educating and preparing our population for a productive adult life and b) reforming inmates once they are incarcerated. Most state budgets would be in the black if we only had as many people locked up as, say, Singapore.

And Loog, there are still PLENTY of run down, ratty hotels out there. Just because you no longer stay in them doesn't mean they disappeared from the national landscape. And yes, there are also plenty of poor people who can't afford to stay anywhere nicer. There are also a shitload of people who can't afford to travel at all, and have never been more than 2 counties away from their birthplace. The only reason average luxury seems to have increased is prevalent overuse of credit. We're a nation of debtors trying to convince ourselves that things are improving.

We'll have to disagree, Ben. Look at the chart again. The question asked was "In the last 12 months, did you fear that you did not have enough money to pay for the food your family needed?" And they got the stat by the % saying yes.

Honestly, I would have answered that question, yes (our grocery bills for 3 toddlers are scary). And my family's income is around 200k per year, which I'd have to think is on the high end of Americans. And I'd define myself as middle class. Clearly I'm not someone most people would consider lives in fear of starvation. We also buy Welch's fruit snacks, pop-tarts, and other general crap that is completely unnecessary.

An objective stat would have been calculating American's disposable income in relation to cost of food.

Imagine what riots would break out if Americans had to survive off of bags of UN rice delivered from the back of a pickup truck.

To me this is a big part of the problem. Whenever someone wants to talk about the problems in America, everyone wants to compare us to some third world nation living off the land and eating a bowl of rice a day. This is ludicrous and of course we look like fucking stars in that company. With our resources and potential and stage of development the only appropriate comparisons are other fully developed countries, where we suddenly don't look so clearly on top of the game after all.


Also...if your household income is 200K, you're in the top 3% of the population. 85% of households bring in less than half that. That may be stretching it to say 200K is middle class.

I would say 200k-300k is still middle class, upper end though. There are just a hell of a lot more middle class and poor than there are upper class.

Not trying to be obnoxious, but it seems to me middle class should be something that covers a large mass of people living in the middle income brackets. Top 3% of income does not sound like that description to me at all. 40% of people make between 36K and 95K. For me, that's a pretty good definition, especially considering, you've got more than twice as many making below that than you do over.

I think of it more in comparison to other incomes above and below than simply dividing america up by thirds. 200k has a lot more in common with somebody making 80k than they do with someone making 500k.

In my personal definition, i'd also take into account HOW that money is being earned, and where that person lives. A person working full-time for 200k is very different than somebody earning 200k from a trust fund or investments. I'd group the first into upper middle class, the second into lower upper class.

In your example, one third of Americans would be upper class? That is preposterous, and implies there are just as many poor as there are rich.

No, in my example, less than 20% of people would be over the place I topped out middle class and over 40% would be below. You're look g at over 40% below 36K, 40% from 36K to 95K and less than 20% above. Less than 15% of the country makes over 100K. Sorry, to me calling 200K middle class in that universe makes no sense. 200K household income puts you above 97% of the country. Top 3% is middle class? Really?

And to me, this is a problem. People make 200K, think they are middle class...just like everyone else...and this skews the conversation. It is like how when congress talks about taxes they sit the limit for tax cuts at 250K and below and most members of congress and many of those who have their ear think that's still middle class, even though it's less than 10% of the country. In my estimation, that's ridiculous. I'm not exactly sure why people so cling to calling themselves middle class as some badge of honor.

I'm not saying you're completely wrong, Nobody, but I do think you're over-estimating the difference in quality of life between 95k and 200k. "It's double!" I know. But what I'm afraid you might be doing is taking a person whose family makes 95k and then sliding up their income to 200k in your head without adjusting anything else. Specifically, a lot of people who make 150k-200k can only do so by living in a place that has a really fucking high cost of living (coughMEcough). The jobs that pay you 100k in Boston pay 60k tops in Madison, for example. My quality of life here is better, and I do enjoy access to a deeper wealth of services (public transport, culture, food, whatever), but I would still consider a 200k family in Boston as solidly middle class. They would drive new-ish subarus, maybe a 3-series beemer. Not a mercedes. They would definitely live in multi-tennant buildings and not a single-family home. Houses anywhere near here start at $450k.

Like I said, not disagreeing with you outright, but you need to put qualifiers on those blanket statements before you get me on board. 200k in Muncie Indiana might be the bottom rung of Rich. 200k in Cambridge, NYC, San Fran, etc is middle class, easily. (And one might argue that 200k in Houma LA with triplets and law school debt might be the same.)

Or put more succinctly,

Yes I chose to live here, but if I packed up and went back to Madison my income would drop back down well into your "middle class" bracket. Does that make sense? The guy making 200k here is not living the life a guy making 200k in Atlanta would be.

my wife and I do well enough, but as said above, we have a lot of expenses. however, a lot of them are voluntary ones and could be greatly reduced if we wanted to (different cars, move to apartment or out to the burbs, cheaper day care, worse insurance, cable/internet/phone, no travel/going out, etc.) i guess I'd consider us upper middle class. we dont buy a lot of expensive shit or throw money around, however, we rarely have to really worry about money. not sure at what point that becomes rich...

I do believe there is a point to cost of living, absolutely. I would just point out that even in New York City, the median income for a household is about $75K. A whole lot more people than I think you seem to realize are making it on a whole lot less, even in major metropolitan areas.

there are a shit ton of 20-30k per year service industry jobs in this country with crappy benefits. good times.

It's that second ivory back scratcher that kicks you up into the top category.

<<----
Family of 5 in Cincinnati on a whole lot less.

mine is just walrus. i have my eye on a mammoth one though.

Yup, and two of those people married and putting their income together equals your new middle class household for way way more of the country than anyone likes to mention...mostly because they generally don't vote or give a fuck about politics since it's pretty much left them behind anyway. Remember, only 30% or so of the population has a college degree. Blue collar unions are basically powerless in more and more regions. This is where the masses now exist. If you're doing better than this, great! But, don't pretend you're right there along with everyone else when you're pulling in 3 and 4 times what a typical household earns because you're not.

You see they have that frozen DNA and are gonna start growing a Mammoth pretty soon?

<--- grabs amex platinum, places advance order

More than a decade after their first attempt, a team of Japanese scientists have announced that they will aim to clone a woolly mammoth in the next five years. Led by Akira Iritani, the team plans on taking mammoth DNA extracted from preserved corpses found in Siberia and inserting it into African elephant eggs that have had their DNA removed. If the insertion is successful, the eggs will be placed in an adult elephant and brought to term. Kinki University’s Faculty of Biology Oriented Science and Technology tried to do exactly this three times previously, starting in 1997. Yet damage to mammoth cells due to extreme cold prevented their success. Now, another Japanese scientist, Teruhiko Wakayama of RIKEN, has developed a technique that allowed him to clone a mouse from a body frozen for 16 years. Iritani’s group is hoping that this technique will provide the missing ingredient that allows them to succeed. Work to find suitable DNA has begun, and Iritani believes they could have a walking, breathing mammoth in just five to six years.

yeah i agree with this. my mom raised two kids while making like 15-20k per year plus a couple hundred bucks per month of child support. she could have used a union haha.

Ooooooooooooooh yeah

would go nicely with my coffee table