Vanishing Act:

Is the American Middle Class Disappearing?

Jenna Pedrin

Professor Jezierski MC 498

5/4/15

Abstract

The goal of this research paper is to look further into and unravel the mystery of today’s

middle class: Is the middle class disappearing? To dig deeper into this question, the research will

be based around the statistics of the United States as a whole, as well as an analysis of two

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metropolitan areas over a number of years; the City of Detroit in Michigan and the City of

Chicago in Illinois. The paper will start with a history of the middle class in the United States.

This will include typical values, housing styles, demography of a city and lifestyles that are

typically associated with what we refer to as the middle class. Next, will be the distinction

between middle class levels such as lower middle and upper middle class. To distinguish each

strata, differences in income levels, spending habits, family life and employment will be looked

at. The increasing wealth gap in the United States will be important to outline when determining

which individuals typically fall into middle class status economically and socially for each city.

In addition, the paper will present a cross-cultural analysis of cities in the United States and

cities in Canada to depict that middle class lifestyles are holding their own in today’s economy in

Canada, but not so much for the United States.

Finally, data used from the U.S. Census will be used to compare populations, employment

rates, demographics and income levels from 1920 to 2010 ( or the most recent data available) in

each city. Methods of comparing class values, lifestyles and income of the past and the present

through census data, consumer reports, literature and maps can answer the research question. By

doing this, the data can tell a story of how middle class cities are rising or declining and what this

means for the indicators of middle and lower class. Since the United States is a middle class

country, is it possible for the middle class to disappear? No it is not. Through the indicators and

methods explained in this paper, it is concluded that the middle class is not disappearing, but

emerging into a new-new middle class; one in which we perceive values and lifestyles in a

different way. The findings suggest that Americans have shifted into a "new normal" way of

looking at class.

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What Is Middle Class

Middle class is extremely difficult to define. Most Americans consider themselves middle class.

A 2005 New York Times article titled Who are the Middle Class? Congressional Research

Service Report for Congress,written by B. W. Cashell, included a survey that found only one

percent of Americans considered themselves to be part upper class and only seven percent

considered themselves part of the lower class (Cashell 1). The rest answered that they are within

the middle class. As of the year 2014, less people consider themselves upper and middle class

while the amount of individuals who consider themselves to be lower class increases in the

United States. Figure 1.1 shows a bar graph provided by pew research center that depicts the

change in the percent of people who identify with upper, middle and lower class between the

years of 2008 and 2014.

Figure 1.1

The middle class is the one which stands between the highest and the lowest strata of society.

Above it is the class of great capitalists; below it the proletariat, the class of wage-workers. But

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what does it mean to be a middle class family in America? Author C. Wright Mills explains in

White Collar: The American Middle Classes, Mills a distinction the "old" and "new" Middle

Classes. The old middle class is characterized by its economic independence, which is built upon

its ownership and the things they produce. Individuals in this category would be small farmers

cultivating their own land and merchants running their own store. The New Middle Class is

made up of employees who work with means of production owned by someone else, with

directions from someone else, in a place that is property of someone else. In comparison to the

old and new middle class, Mills describes the office as "a great locale of white collar activity"

(226-227), has become the factory- experiencing the same evolution deindustrialization and

deskilling, so that individuals can operate machines under the minimum watch. Mills describes

worker alienation of white collar workers not just from their labor, but from themselves as they

"sell themselves" in the "personality market” (Mills 3). Satisfaction from their work is a decent

income, status and personal power the job offers.

In The Middling Sorts: Explorations in the History of the American Middle Class authors

Burton J. Bledstein and Robert D. Johnston compile works of many scholars who researched

middle class life and explains the notion that the term middle class is central to the definition of

America since the time it was created. The scholars who contributed to this work contrast the

middle class as a series of historically specific and culturally contested ideas, practices, and

things-this is beyond the information collected in the past and static models created by social

scientists. To being, the authors describe that during the eighteenth century, most Americans

lived and worked on small farms. They used the labor of only their own families. Towards the

end of the eighteenth century, the "middling sort" or middle class, emerged as an important role

in society and government. These middling men and women worked as professionals, such as

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lawyers, doctors, or entrepreneurs who owned stores. They were could have been landowners

and homeowners. Over 90% of American citizens consider themselves middle class or “working

class”- neither rich or poor, not upper or lower, but somewhere right in the middle (Bledstein 1).

However even though there is a multitude of different requirements to be considered middle

class status, author Bledstein argues that how a person lives links them to middle class status, not

necessarily what they do (Bledstein 5). The middle class was literally made by those who were

not born into wealth and decided that just because a comfortable lifestyle was not handed to them

doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be able to live one. They worked to be in a situation that was not

necessarily poor but not necessarily rich-they worked to be in the middle of the two. Once the

ideal middle class structure was established, it never changed. Even in today’s society we strive

and work hard to get a college degree, own a nice house in a nice neighborhood and drive a good

car; things that our parents and grandparents aimed for.

The middle class lifestyle is practiced. Each new generation that is born into a family of middle

social class status learns from the previous and spends their lives working to maintain the

comfortable atmosphere their parents provided and avoiding the fall into a lower social status.

With the American Dream being unchangeable, remaining in a middle class status is something

that is practiced and worked for, not something that just is.While the rich are getting even richer

and the poor becoming poorer, what does this mean for the millions of Americans who consider

themselves to be of middle class status? Due to the shift from a rural economy to an urban

economy, many lifestyles and practices that infiltrated the middle class disappeared as working

individuals had to make a transition into the new world.

Middle Class Employment

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The types of jobs that pay middle-class wages, typically between $40,000 and $80,000 in 2014

dollars, have shifted since 1980. Fewer of these positions are in male-dominated production

occupations, while a greater share are in workplaces more open to women. For example, figure

1.2 shows that occupations such as registered nurses, mathematical and computer sciences,

supervisors and proprietors, adjusters and investigators, and managers and administrators are

projected to see a great increase in employment between the years of 2012 and 2022 (Bureau of

Labor Statistics), while machine operators, production supervisors, construction trades, freight

stock and material handlers and precision metal working occupations are seen very little

prosperity between the years of 2012 and 2022 (Bureau of Labor Statistics).

Figure 1.2

The above graph depicts that there is a change in typical middle class occupation stereotypes.

Decades ago, it was common for women to stay in the home and take care of the house and

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family, and uncommon for males to be in health care or personal care occupations, which were

typically held by women who decided to work outside of the home. Male dominated occupations

such as farming and construction are disappearing.

Middle Class Income

In Gilbert’s book, The American Class Structure in an Age of Growing Inequality, in which

The Income Parade: Growing Inequality in the distribution of income and wealth is published,

he argues that the rate of inequality in terms of distribution of wealth and income is steadily

growing in the United States. The income parade is analyzed by a distribution of households

across a range of incomes and a distribution of income shares among a stratified sample of a

population. Gilbert makes it clear that there is a difference between what is considered wealth

and what is considered income. Gilbert defines income as the flow of money over time and

wealth as the value of assets held at a point in time (Gilbert 74). To outline how unequal the

distribution in America is between lower, middle and upper class, Gilbert creates this image of

the income parade. The marchers in the parade represent all households counted by the Census

Bureau, marching for hours at a time. The lower the marchers income, the shorter their height.

At the beginning of the parade, marchers are the shortest. They are households that have suffered

a net income loss after the depression such as small business owners and small investors (Gilbert

74). After five minutes, we get to the poor marchers. They are about a foot tall. The household is

considered poor by Federal Government standards. These marchers receive assistance from

programs such as welfare and social security. Many of them are elderly, women and minorities

(Gilbert 76). The next sets of marchers come 20 minutes into the parade and are on the verge of

middle class but not quite. They are still poor but above the Federal Poverty line. Marchers are

standing about three feet tall. Households are usually made up of one wage earner and female

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headed, with the individual working low-skill, blue collar and clerical work, making just enough

money to get by (Gilbert 76).

Thirty minutes into the parade, marchers from the mainstream middle class come into view,

being just about four to seven feet tall. Marchers in this category are working lower managerial

or professional positions, technicians and skilled blue-collar workers who own their own cars

and homes. They make enough to live comfortably and have money left out of their budget to

indulge in luxuries such as a vacation (Gilbert 77). Nearing the end of the parade, we have ten to

twelve foot marchers still in the mainstream category. These marchers work as high earning

professionals or high paying blue-collar workers who live comfortable, spending money on nicer

clothes, newer cars and nice household items. At the end of the parade are the rich marchers.

They are giants, marching only five minutes of the entire parade. They work as doctors, lawyers,

stockbrokers and corporate executives. Owning multiple houses, multiple cars and household

help, the rich live lives greatly different than the poor (Gilbert 77-78).

Gilbert’s breakdown of the income parade is very important when looking at the unequal

distribution of wealth and income in America. The parade shows that there is many little people

and only a few giants and the source of income and occupation is extremely different from the

beginning and end of the parade. Due to a rapid growth of income at the last leg of the parade,

the top tier of the rich are getting richer while the poor stays where they are or are getting poorer.

The image of the income parade proves that there is a growing inequality in relation to the

distribution of wealth and income in America. The income of families with two children has

risen substantially over time, in part because the parents of two children are a different group

now versus twenty years ago ( Census Bureau). Head of households have become more

educated, earning a college diploma, allowing them to make more income and but get stuck

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working longer hours. At the same time, these middle class goals have become harder to attain

because the costs of housing, healthcare, and college have risen faster than the families income

(Samuel 121). Because of this, it is believed that it is harder to attain a middle class lifestyle now

than it was in the past decades.

Below in Figure 1.3, is a chart courtesy of the Huffington Post, that outlines the change in

average income during the Great Depression (1933-1934) compared to the Great Recession

(2009-2010).

Figure 1.3

The differences is middle class income in the Detroit and the City of Chicago are also

extremely stratified. In Detroit, middle class income is considered to be between the amounts per

year of $12,000 at the lower end of the spectrum and $59,000 at the upper tier of the class

whereas in Chicago, middle class income is considered to be between the amounts of $26,000 at

the lower end and $101,000 at the upper tier a year (Census Bureau). Authors Strobel and

Peterson give a detailed analysis of the uneven distribution of income and wealth in America,

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and how the gap will only continue to grow. In studying the disappearance of the middle class,

Strobel and Peterson determined that the middle class is indeed continually shrinking but in

addition, sizable amounts of economic benefits are benefiting fewer and fewer individuals and

families. In their research, there is an analysis of the relationship between economic and political

power. Strobel and Peterson conclude that there is an unique class conflict, which “adds to our

historic racial tension, and new clashes along gender and generational lines” (Strobel and

Peterson 70).

Middle Class Consumption

“Consumption is a social, cultural, and economic process of choosing goods, and this process

reflects the opportunities and constraints of modernity” (Zukin and McGuire 1). It is an

assumption that families that strive to be middle class want to attain certain things, including

their own home, a car or two, savings for retirement, college savings, health care, and a regular

family vacation (Samuel 38). “A hypothetical household budgets indicate that a middle class

lifestyle is possible even among relatively lower income families under the right circumstances”(

Samuel 112). However, only a few unintended expenses can transfer any family from their

middle class status into the lower class tier. Loss of a job, unexpected illness that isn’t covered

by health insurance, or the need to help out an elderly parent can create a severe budget crisis for

families whose lives heavily revolve around the budget they create for themselves. This will

require them to forego some of the things that middle class American families expect (Samuel

129).

Housing is the biggest portion of middle class budgets (Samuel 130). The middle class

American Dream is to own a house of your own, but in today’s economy, we see more home

renters than homeowners. For example, in the city of Detroit there are 269,445 occupied housing

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units-137,730 occupied units are homeowners and 131,715 occupied units are home renters as of

the 2010 census. In Chicago, there are 1,033,022 occupied housing units-493,819 occupied units

are homeowners and 539,203 occupied units are home renters as of 2010.

Not all families will value the same aspirations or value other aspects of middle class life

equally. For example, some families consider three cars essential for their well-being while

others prefer to rely on one car or public transportation (Bell 40). This is true for Detroit and

Chicago’s middle class. A family living in the city of Detroit may rely much more heavily on a

car versus a family living in the city of Chicago where public transportation is efficient and

easily accessible. Similarly, some families may choose to put off or forego luxury investments

such as vacations or sending their children to private colleges, which tend to be more expensive

that public or community colleges. These are all personal preferences and have certain trade-offs.

Standard Of Living

In the book Standard of Living : The Measure of the Middle Class in Modern America, written

by Marina Moskowitz outlines how the values of life are different between cultural middle class

groups but very similar across the middle class as a whole. Moskowitz proves the argument that

middle class living and values change depending on which area of the country you live in. For

example, for a family living in Chicago, owning a car is less desirable than for a family living in

Detroit. While some middle class standards disappear when transitioning between two

demographic areas, some values such as family are always present in middle class homes.

Moskowitz makes the assumption that the standard of living is how Americans wanted to live,

not how Americans actually lived. The standard of living is not an amount of income or

possessions that the family owns but is a cultural stigma of how one should carry out their lives

(Moskowitz 5). After the war, goods and services became increasingly available to consumers

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and created jobs such as sales people and the standard of living became closely identified with

the middle class. Moskowitz looks at how not only goods, but also ideas about commerce were

one of the key mechanisms in which the standard of living and the middle class lifestyle was

created. The idea of a standard of living implies that certain items are required to be a part of

modern society and that particular cultural norms had to be enforced for families that hoped to

"measure up" economically and culturally (Moskowitz 17).

Moskowitz sets up her book The Standard of Living: The measure of Middle Class in Modern

America into case studies, each depicting a typical setting for middle-class home life. Moskowitz

begins to analyze a study of the silver plate flatware industry and explains why and how items

like silverware transitioned from luxuries enjoyed by the rich and wealthy to standard items in

middle-class homes (Moskowitz 31). The role of media is important to middle class life.

Advertisements schemed to convince the working public that using silverware could and should

be a part of their daily lives. In addition to the middle class family dinner table being remade,

Moskowitz claims that the bathroom was also transformed by the decorative and modern

restroom fixtures promoted by companies such as Kohler (Moskowitz 45). Kohler established

the standard of health and decency. Manufacturers honed in on the emphasis of physical and

moral benefits of bathing being promoted by public health officials. Bathtubs and sinks were

heavy, expensive and required an infrastructure of plumbing and piping for installation.

Moskowitz depicts how new meanings of privacy and cleanliness did not transform American

bathrooms per say. The Kohler Company also developed marketing techniques to establish itself

as a desired brand in the public eye and created jobs for local townspeople such as plumbers and

installers ( Moskowitz 52).

Family Structure

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Family is a strong indicator of middle class living. For example, the classical ideal of a middle

class home will consist of two married parents and two to four children living in it. However,

throughout the years that ideal has changed. People are waiting longer to get married and make a

commitment to have children. What is more, it is more common to have a single-parent

household than it was years ago. In figure 1.3 is a table consisting of households by household

type in the cities of Detroit and Chicago according to the 1980 Census.

Figure 1.3

As depicted above, in both Detroit and Chicago, having a two person household was more

common than having a single person household in 1980. In the city of Chicago, there was

754,188 (69.0%) two or more person households compared to just 339,221(31.0%) one person

households in 1980. In the city of Detroit, there was 308,177 (71.1%) two or more person

households compared to 125,311(28.9%) one person households in 1980 (US Census). In

addition, in Chicago under two or more persons there was 465,620 (42.6%) married-couple

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homes compared to 240,334 (22.0%) non-married individual households in 1980. In Detroit,

there was 173,206 (40.0%) married-couple homes compared to 116,12 (26.8%) non-married

individual households in 1980 (US Census).

To compare the change in household type, figure 1.4 is a table consisting of household types in

the cities of Detroit and Chicago according to the 2010 Census.

Figure 1.4

According to the 2010 census table above, the gap between married-couple and other family

households are shrunk compared to 1980. In the city of Chicago, there was 334,303 (32.0%)

married-couple households and 242,490 (23.2%) other family households. In the city of Detroit,

there was 57,982 (60.5%) married-couple households and 104,942 (39.0%) other family

households. Figures 1.3 and 1.4 show that there is a decline in the classic middle class family

ideal of a married-two person household.

Cultural Comparison

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Authors James E. Foster, Michael C. Wolfson, Jel Classification D explore population and

decline of the middle class in the United States compared to Canada in Polarization and decline

of the middle class: Canada and the United States. By making this comparison, it is outlined

how the distribution of the middle class income is becoming less stratified and the rich upper

class will continue to gain more wealth as the middle and lower class individuals will continue to

get poorer, furthering inequality in the United States. More importantly, the study shows a cross-

country comparison between the United States and Canada in which it declares that polarization

is on the rise in the United States but leveling out or declining in Canada. Comparing the

economic structure of the United States and Canada overtime can prove there is a decline in the

middle class individuals in terms of income and labor. The middle class makes up much of the

nation’s labor force and is a key player in the success of the market. In addition, large portions of

tax dollars are collected from the middle class in the form of property taxes and sales taxes.

When compared to Canada, authors Foster and Wolfson noticed a trend in the United States that

is not present in Canada-: “the size and perhaps the relative affluence of the middle class

appeared to be declining” (Foster and Wolfson).

Assimilation not Disappearance

In The American Middle Class: A Cultural History, Samuel argues that contrary to popular

belief, the crisis that the middle class faces is not something that is entirely new. Samuel states

that “ since the mid-1960s the middle class has been in a kind of crisis mode, although how it has

played out has varied significantly based on the prevailing social, economic, and political

climate” (Samuel 160). The American Middle Class: A Cultural History outlines how the idea of

what the middle class is has changed over time, while showing how the root of middle class

troubles stretch back to the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s. Although the middle class is

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experiencing what seems like a demise, Samuel argues that the image of the “enduring” middle

class remains the heart and soul of the United States. Society’s concern for the fate of the middle

class is something that has helped tie the American middle class, and in extension the nation,

together. The author begins by opening with a very important part of President Obama’s 2012

State of the Union Address: “The American promise is that if you work hard, you could do well

enough to raise a family, own a home, send your kids to college, and put a little away for

retirement. The defining issue of our time is how to keep that promise alive. We can either settle

for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of

Americans barely get by. Or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot,

everyone does their fair share and everyone plays by the same set of rules. What’s at stake are

not Democratic values or Republican values, but American values. We have to reclaim them”

(Samuel 1).

This idea presents the theory that the middle class is not disappearing, just the idea of what

middle class is is changing, illustrated by different events in American history. Families across

the income spectrum often report themselves as middle class. This suggests that most American

families share the desire for economic stability and a better life for their children. Income may

not be the primary determinant of whether a family considers itself middle class, although

income will shape and constrain choices.

Economic Decline

Author Fredrick Strobel of Upward Dreams Downward Mobility: The Economic Decline of the

American Middle Class, attempts to explain the demise of the middle class by dividing the

problem into four parts. The first part of his explanation tracks the rise of the middle class which

he mainly attributes to the New Deal introduced under President Roosevelt. It explains what the

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New Deal did for the middle class and how when the New Deal unraveled, the middle class

started to unravel. Next Strobel explains the magnitude of the decline through a number of case

studies. In the studies, he unveils how the state of the middle class is associated with the rise of

private economic power and concentration of wealth into few numbers. The third portion of

Upward Dreams Downward Mobility: The Economic Decline of the American Middle Class

analyzes the role of corporate tax cuts, personal income tax increases, anti-wage earner behavior

and the mismanagement of finances in the acceleration of middle class decline. The last portion

of his book, Strobel suggests what should be done to save the middle class. He describes the

consequences America has faced having a multi classed society such as loss of the mass market,

loss of white, blue and professional jobs, and suggests that a new economic policy should be put

in place to save middle class jobs and middle class money.

Decline do to Racism

Although there is a distinction between the fight for race equality and the struggle of class

identity, some areas of these two problems intersect.The Black “middle class” historically has

been formed because of the relatively higher-paying jobs and benefits of union-organized

manufacturing. Black professionals as a group grew after the victory of the civil rights

movement in 1960s (Bell 54). In Middle Class Families: Social and Geographical Mobility

author Colin Bell tracks the social and geographical mobility of black and white individuals

living in middle class neighborhoods. He describes the differences in opportunity between the

two races by outlining education levels, employment opportunities and the chance to afford to

own a home. In his research, he explains how inner cities became predominantly black and

suburbs became predominantly white. Bell also explains how class status affects one’s ability for

upward mobility economically, geographically and socially. Poor Blacks move into an area the

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schools decline, violence increase in existing middle class. In a domino effect, whites flee the

area and the jobs follow, leading to unemployment and wages dropping, leaving blacks in the

same impoverished situation they were in before. For example, Figure 1.5 shows the change in

median income in the metro-area of Chicago from the year 1980 to the year 2012. Information

provided by Social Explorer. The maps show that there is a massive increase in <45% median

income areas since 1980. There is very little demographic in that income range in the 1980 map,

but it is the majority income range in the 2012 map. This figures tell a story of how racism can

lead to the growth of a social service and no-income population leading to a steady erosion in the

buying capability of middle class jobs.

Figure 1.5

Crisis in Middle Class Values

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The Failure of Success: The American Crisis in Values written by Ester Milner defines the core

values of the middle class and explains how the middle class is declining by their own means-

because they are dissatisfied with the way their lives are going. Milner opens by dedicating the

book to the “influential group in the American middle class; people of all ages who are

dissatisfied with the pattern of their lives and with accepted group values, but have given

themselves over neither to the absolutism of scapegoating nor the absolutism of one

foreordained, clear-cut path to personal and social salvation” (Milner ix). Milner claims that

people of middle class status collectively share a common view that high occupational and

consumer status will convert us into happy and whole human beings, but we as humans are never

truly satisfied. Miller also breaks down the middle class into lower middle and upper middle.

The lower middle are skilled tradesmen or lower-paid professionals who see money as a symbol

of status and strive to attain the value of having status in the community (Milner 10). The upper-

middle are highly educated professionals and/or hold managerial positions, live in desirable

neighborhoods and take pride in their status and value to the community ( Milner 10). With the

change in economy and change in societal value, it seems that the ideal lifestyle of the middle

class is never attainable. People will always want more. The Failure of Success: The American

Crisis in Values analyzes the nature and root of the middle class crisis. Milner argues that

recognizing the nature of a problem is the first and most essential step towards a solution no

matter how socially and personally difficult (Milner ix).

Conclusion

Being middle class isn't what it used to be. However, it is not disappearing. The United States

has been in a recession since the early 2000s, with a decline in middle class indicators such as

income, consumption and employment. Before the recession, households have evolved from the

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classical view on the middle class-nice house in a nice neighborhood, owning a car and spend

time with family to having a home, maybe a vacation home, owning two or more cars and

replacing family time with hours on the computer or watching tv. Due to hard economic times,

middle class families are forced to give up come to those luxuries. Because of this sacrifice,

people of middle class status have it easier to point out someone who is better off than them.

Although the living in current middle class seems like more of a struggle than in previous

generations, it is in part because how we define middle class is different. Perhaps our

expectations of the standard of living are higher. The middle class gotten to used to expecting

more. The Middle class is not disappearing. The Middle class is just changing into a newer

creative, innovative and self sustaining middle class.

Bibliography

Samuel, Lawrence R. The American Middle Class: A Cultural History, 2014. Print.

Milner, Esther. The Failure of Success: The American Crisis in Values. New York : Exposition

Press, 1959. Print.

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Moskowitz, Marina. Standard of Living: The Measure of the Middle Class in Modern America.

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Strobel, Fredrick R., and Wallace C. Peterson. The Coming Class War and How to Avoid It:

Rebuilding the American Middle Class. Armonk, N.Y: ME. Sharpe, 1999. Print.

Bell, Colin. Middle Class Families: Social and Geographical Mobility. London: Routledge,

2000. Print

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Huffington, Adrianna. Third World America: How our politicians are abandoning the middle

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book. Internet Source.

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http://www.pewtrusts.org/en

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