Economic mobility: Are you better off than your parent(s)?

[KHV]

My dad was well off, when he passed away he left me 70k, I used it as a property deposit. Both my parents had good jobs, I'd say I am financially better off than my mum but I won't even get close to my dad's salary

[Marka Ragnos]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

[mjmooney]

Don't think it's to do with willingess, more ability. My parents were broke, so what I got from them was not financial. I'm better off, so I help my kids out financially where I can.

[Marka Ragnos]

When I hear my dad talk about the "classes" as he encountered them in the West Midlands in the 1930 to 1950s, I feel a resentment I don't think he felt but I do. It's internalized with him, a kind of built-in deference that is "hard-wired." I love him but I find this habit of deference repulsive.

But I imagine this is a thing of the past for you all? I don't think England is like this anymore, right?

[MakemineVanilla]

Counting up the people I know, the remarkable thing is how everyone seems to have stayed in the same class as their parents (C1 & C2).

I know a few people whose parents were DE but those are very much the exception.

It kind of confirms my suspicion that kids only succeed as far as their parents allow them.

 

 

I'd have to disagree with that.

Most people i know are professionals - doctors, dentists, accountants, bankers, pharmacists, opticians, etc...

90% of their parents were immigrants to this country and were semi-skilled workers at best.  The parents pushed us hard to achieve, so we would have a better life than them, and in most cases we have succeeded in moving up the class scale.   

I was really writing about my own white working-class experience.

The one guy I know who made the biggest step and became a surgeon, is of Pakistani origin.

I put his success down to cultural factors because he has done a lot better from a poorer start than loads of white working-class people I know, who had every opportunity (grammar school etc) but still contrived to remain in the same class as their parents. 

 

[MakemineVanilla]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

My I refer you to this Python sketch. 

The reason it is funny is that it is an inversion of the typical post-war drama where upwardly mobile children found themselves estranged from their parents because they had been educated into a higher class - sort of a The Corn is Green, thing going on.  Look up E P Thomson's definition of class to clarify what I mean by class relations. 

I think that working class parents sometimes have doubts about helping their kids too much because they think it will 'spoil' them, or dread that their children will rise into a class they think is hostile to them.

Edited September 29, 2015 by limpid
fixed embed

[Pez1974]

I'm 41 and I am much better off than my folks were. This is down to 4 main factors...

My job - I'm an accountant. I have worked abroad (on secondment); I put my career first throughout my 20's and climb the greasy pol (so to speak) quickly. In my 30's I have slowed down in a well paid job.

Education - I passed the 11+ and went to grammar school. My brother didn't. We are not much different with regards base intelligence but the education I got there, compared to his at the local comprehensive, gave me a massive boost in my early career. Neither of my parents went to grammar school, or anything like it.

My parents - they always encouraged me and pushed me. When I made the difficult choices in education and career, I always had their support which gave me the courage to do what I knew to be right - like move abroad with work when I was 24.

Luck - I bought my first house in the late 90's so benefitted from the property boom, unlike those who followed. I gambled with a couple of redundancies, which have helped me pay off my mortgage, and always got back in work quickly. I and my family have always been healthy.

Without the last one, we're all screwed!

 

[ender4]

When I hear my dad talk about the "classes" as he encountered them in the West Midlands in the 1930 to 1950s, I feel a resentment I don't think he felt but I do. It's internalized with him, a kind of built-in deference that is "hard-wired." I love him but I find this habit of deference repulsive.

But I imagine this is a thing of the past for you all? I don't think England is like this anymore, right?

the class system doesn't really exist anymore, 90% of people would just class themselves as middle-class whether they are a dentist earning £100k a year or an admin clerk earning £18k.

If there are classes, it simply splits into: The under-class (those not working, on benefits), the middle-class (those working), the upper-class (those too rich to have to need to work).

These 3 classes keep themselves very separate to each other, but as 90% fall into middle class, most mingle without any class bias. 

 

[lapal_fan]

Sounds like the people starting work in the 90s got a lot of good things from the housing boom.

Meanwhile, graduating in 2008 and borrowing money for a 80,000 pound mortgage has saddled me with an overpaid interest rate for a house I have made money on (because of gutting it and doing it up with the help of my old man) and 2 redundancies.

[Marka Ragnos]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

My I refer you to this Python sketch. 

The reason it is funny is that it is an inversion of the typical post-war drama where upwardly mobile children found themselves estranged from their parents because they had been educated into a higher class - sort of a The Corn is Green, thing going on.  Look up E P Thomson's definition of class to clarify what I mean by class relations. 

I think that working class parents sometimes have doubts about helping their kids too much because they think it will 'spoil' them, or dread that their children will rise into a class they think is hostile to them.

That's a funny sketch. Was actually familiar with EP Thompson, believe it or not. Very interesting what you say about parents fearful of their children facing hostility. Something sad and scary about that!

[Marka Ragnos]

When I hear my dad talk about the "classes" as he encountered them in the West Midlands in the 1930 to 1950s, I feel a resentment I don't think he felt but I do. It's internalized with him, a kind of built-in deference that is "hard-wired." I love him but I find this habit of deference repulsive.

But I imagine this is a thing of the past for you all? I don't think England is like this anymore, right?

 

the class system doesn't really exist anymore, 90% of people would just class themselves as middle-class whether they are a dentist earning £100k a year or an admin clerk earning £18k.

If there are classes, it simply splits into: The under-class (those not working, on benefits), the middle-class (those working), the upper-class (those too rich to have to need to work).

These 3 classes keep themselves very separate to each other, but as 90% fall into middle class, most mingle without any class bias. 

 

I gotta disagree, respectfully. One in five Britons live below official poverty markers. When I lived in London and worked in newspapers in the early 2000s, the class system was alive and well. The cultural elitism, the lack of understanding of working-class experience, the tendency to write off whole portions of the country as unworthy -- oh, my!  It wasn't just about money, either. Money is a big part of it, but only part.

I think the middle class often breaks down into several sub-classes, too. Lower middle, middle middle, and upper middle -- and that latter group, in my experience, had enormous power and influence in driving culture.

[MakemineVanilla]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

My I refer you to this Python sketch. 

The reason it is funny is that it is an inversion of the typical post-war drama where upwardly mobile children found themselves estranged from their parents because they had been educated into a higher class - sort of a The Corn is Green, thing going on.  Look up E P Thomson's definition of class to clarify what I mean by class relations. 

I think that working class parents sometimes have doubts about helping their kids too much because they think it will 'spoil' them, or dread that their children will rise into a class they think is hostile to them.

That's a funny sketch. Was actually familiar with EP Thompson, believe it or not. Very interesting what you say about parents fearful of their children facing hostility. Something sad and scary about that!

That's not what I meant.

For clarity it should have read 'hostile to themselves'.

In that Thompson defined class identity in those terms:

articulate the identity of their interests as between themselves, and as against other men whose interests are different from (and usually opposed to) theirs.

 

So crudely put, they would see the 'gaffer' classes as hostile to the workers, and social class as being condescending or even contemptuous of the working class.

And they wouldn't want their kids to turn into the 'them'.

 

 

[Marka Ragnos]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

My I refer you to this Python sketch. 

The reason it is funny is that it is an inversion of the typical post-war drama where upwardly mobile children found themselves estranged from their parents because they had been educated into a higher class - sort of a The Corn is Green, thing going on.  Look up E P Thomson's definition of class to clarify what I mean by class relations. 

I think that working class parents sometimes have doubts about helping their kids too much because they think it will 'spoil' them, or dread that their children will rise into a class they think is hostile to them.

That's a funny sketch. Was actually familiar with EP Thompson, believe it or not. Very interesting what you say about parents fearful of their children facing hostility. Something sad and scary about that!

That's not what I meant.

For clarity it should have read 'hostile to themselves'.

In that Thompson defined class identity in those terms:

articulate the identity of their interests as between themselves, and as against other men whose interests are different from (and usually opposed to) theirs.

 

So crudely put, they would see the 'gaffer' classes as hostile to the workers, and social class as being condescending or even contemptuous of the working class.

And they wouldn't want their kids to turn into the 'them'.

 

 

Fascinating. Yes, I see now. In way, to my mind, that's even scarier, as a response to class difference, in those parents. It's a way of allowing fear and anger to, in effect, destroy their children's options. I wonder if you would agree, also, that this fear of having children rise into a class hostile to themselves can also take the form of an unacknowledged, unspoken parental jealousy of children.

[MakemineVanilla]

Nope. My parents were always well off, their parents had fancy jobs with tidy incomes, and my folks did well enough that now neither currently work regularly, ( late 50's - 60 ) but they bought up a few properties in the early nineties to rent out, which has obviously worked out very well for them. 

I am 30, would be marked as in the low income bracket, currently enrolled on a second post graduate qualification but have been renting for ages, and will continue to do so for a couple more years. I am fortunate in that my folks will be able to help me out with a house, without them I'd be screwed.

 

 

The willingness of parents to help their children and the expectation of children that they will be helped is definitely a strong class marker, in my experience.

 

 

This is an intriguing statement.  Wish that you could elaborate a bit ... I think I grasp but not sure?

My I refer you to this Python sketch. 

The reason it is funny is that it is an inversion of the typical post-war drama where upwardly mobile children found themselves estranged from their parents because they had been educated into a higher class - sort of a The Corn is Green, thing going on.  Look up E P Thomson's definition of class to clarify what I mean by class relations. 

I think that working class parents sometimes have doubts about helping their kids too much because they think it will 'spoil' them, or dread that their children will rise into a class they think is hostile to them.

That's a funny sketch. Was actually familiar with EP Thompson, believe it or not. Very interesting what you say about parents fearful of their children facing hostility. Something sad and scary about that!

That's not what I meant.

For clarity it should have read 'hostile to themselves'.

In that Thompson defined class identity in those terms:

articulate the identity of their interests as between themselves, and as against other men whose interests are different from (and usually opposed to) theirs.

 

So crudely put, they would see the 'gaffer' classes as hostile to the workers, and social class as being condescending or even contemptuous of the working class.

And they wouldn't want their kids to turn into the 'them'.

 

 

Fascinating. Yes, I see now. In way, to my mind, that's even scarier, as a response to class difference, in those parents. It's a way of allowing fear and anger to, in effect, destroy their children's options. I wonder if you would agree, also, that this fear of having children rise into a class hostile to themselves can also take the form of an unacknowledged, unspoken parental jealousy of children.

I know exactly what you mean. Failing out loyalty to your class or race, tragically traps people.

[Marka Ragnos]

 

I know exactly what you mean. Failing out loyalty to your class or race, tragically traps people.

Now that's an incredibly complicated whole new set of discussions, really. I would separate the two -- race and class -- because there are so many fine distinctions as well as historical and local forces that make it hard to generalize, IMO. I feel unease at the whole concept of "race loyalty," partly because I think it can be employed in ways that aren't acceptable.

Edited September 29, 2015 by Plastic Man

[mjmooney]

When I hear my dad talk about the "classes" as he encountered them in the West Midlands in the 1930 to 1950s, I feel a resentment I don't think he felt but I do. It's internalized with him, a kind of built-in deference that is "hard-wired." I love him but I find this habit of deference repulsive.

But I imagine this is a thing of the past for you all? I don't think England is like this anymore, right?

My parents epitomised two distinct attitudes. Both were working class, but my mother was ashamed of it, whereas my dad wasn't.

My mom voted Conservative most of her life, and told me as a child that we were middle class. By this, she meant 'nice', or 'respectable' - as opposed to the worst label of all: 'common'.

My dad was a proud working class socialist. It was one of the many things that they bickered about.

I didn't meet 'proper' middle class people until I went to grammar school - kids whose parents owned their own houses (as opposed to our council flat), who had careers like doctors and solicitors and accountants (as opposed to my dad's factory work), who had skiiing holidays (as opposed to our week in a Paignton b&b ), who ate lunch and supper (rather than dinner and tea), who followed (and played) 'rugger' rather than 'soccer', who had cars and disdained buses.

Of course, I now have many of those lifestyle elements myself. But I've never felt that I've joined that 'club', nor do I want to.

[snowychap]

 

the class system doesn't really exist anymore

 

I think that's nonsense - it's just that it's a much more complicated and less cleanly categorized thing nowadays that perhaps even 50/60 years ago.

And here's why I think it's nonsense:

, 90% of people would just class themselves as middle-class whether they are a dentist earning £100k a year or an admin clerk earning £18k.

If there are classes, it simply splits into: The under-class (those not working, on benefits), the middle-class (those working), the upper-class (those too rich to have to need to work).

These 3 classes keep themselves very separate to each other, but as 90% fall into middle class, most mingle without any class bias. 

Which is still a class system regardless of the numbers you have rather arbitrarily ascribed to each class.

 

If you want to see regular and frequent examples of why this country (not perhaps more than any/many other(s) but it's this country the question was asked about) is still riddled with class problems then pick up any national newspaper, read opinion pieces and blogs, visit forums, read tweets, wander in to pubs and see just how much punching down there still is.

Edited September 29, 2015 by snowychap

[Xann]

My Grandad was a Colonel in the army and wanted my Old Boy to follow his footsteps.

Dad didn't particularly enjoy it and left. Grandad didn't like this, Dad felt he'd lost the Old Man's respect.

He worked like a bastard and via pie tins and chocolate ended up a director in the Jewellery Quarter.

70s or early 80s Grandad asks how much Dad was on. Respect restored.

It all went tits up later, Dad went from Merc to Proton and we moved next door to an off license

Grandad was gone then, but tbf my Old Boy stepped it up again to see himself into retirement.

 

That was his challenge.

 

Mine has pretty much been to keep myself entertained.

There is a lure with money, and I dabbled for a while. There were a lot of sharks in suits and people that read the Daily Star.

 

Only ever tapped my Dad up once since leaving home. 20 years ago for a deposit on a flat. £300, he wouldn't take it back.

 

[ender4]

ok, so maybe i over simplified saying the class system doesn't exist anymore.

Yes, its less well defined, with less sub-classes and layers, and people are less bothered about it.

Maybe older people are still more defined by it than younger people?

 

[lapal_fan]

There's loads of residual class bias like what drinks you like, what shops you shop in, what music you like, what films you like, what cars you drive, what TV shows you watch, what clothes you wear, what your parents do, what you look like, how much you earn. 

Being middle class (I.e. a working person as it was deemed a couple of posts up) is a **** one-up-man show.  Some people are worse than others, some people can't wait to tell you their wall paper cost £15 a roll or how their new fridge dispenses ice and it's a bargain at £800.  Or that their new Audi/BMW/Quashqai is better than everyone else's black Audi/BMW/Quashqai because it has a different break light to last years model.  Having kids is a competition and "look at me".  "My baby crawled at 1 month", "my baby said Xylophone when he was 10 minutes old".

Life in the middle is a big gay dick-swinging competition and I **** hate it. 

I'll win the lottery or something because creating my own company seems like too much hard work.

I don't play the lottery.