Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Motivated by the discussion in the discussion thread entitled Does Canada have the same 'grammar school desperation'?, I have taken my life in my hands and written a Wiki article called Social Classes-Canada.

I say I've taken my life in my hands, because I feel the topic is controversial. But, with that having been said, I believe it would be helpful for prospective immigrants to know about these things. So I felt that the "risk" involved in writing the article and the possibility of attracting criticism, was worth it.

Another opportunity for criticism arises from the fact that I've never lived in the UK. That makes it particularly tricky to write a controversial and sensitive article for a British readership.

On the topic of criticism, please be aware that anyone can edit a Wiki article. If you disagree with the article, feel free to change it. If you don't know how to edit a Wiki article or cannot be arsed to do so, you're welcome to add your comments to this thread. I'll check on the thread over the next few days and, if I find what I think are valid observations, I'll add them to the article.
x

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I think you've got it about right Judy.

The Class issue is definitely a big Plus for me here in Canada, I loath(ed) the class system in the UK.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Hrrm.

Thank you for the article. I do have a few questions which are on my mind. After having spent the last 3 years learning, investigating, and getting to know Canadians I was under the distinct impression that Canada lacks a true "Middle Class". Looking at http://www12.statcan.ca/census-recen...nc-rev-eng.cfm that seems to be supported by that data, but of course I do not know so well. Someone that would not be considered to be "middle class" in mainland Europe (Like a Truck Driver), could make a lot of money in Canada doing dangerous trucking jobs. Therefore I was wondering how "middle class" is defined in your article?

I would also think that the distribution listed here:
http://www12.statcan.ca/english/cens...NAMEE=&VNAMEF=

seems to support a fairly large base of "lower to above median income" a thinner layer of middle class income and of course the thin layer of teh super rich.

So my question is:
"middle class" and the distinction thereof is usually defined by
a) The type of people and thier education you call friends.
b) Your own education.
in the country I grew up in (Austria).

Thank you!

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

What class system?

OK, I accept the Royals may annoy some people, but I doubt very much that the Aristocracy ever really meet the middle or working classes so how do they really know what "they" are like. It seems to me to be more based on insecurities and jealousy if you ask me - it's all self imposed. The "higher" classes don't give a monkey's about the "lower" ones. Billy Connolly had it right, it's all about the Pringle wearing Volvo brigade wishing they were something they're not and looking down on the "working class".

I have mixed with the very "top" and the very "bottom" of English society and have never felt "lower" or "higher" than any of them. It's a state of mind:p

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I too have mixed with the highest and the lowest, In fact that was my biggest problem, that it was near impossible for me to mix my friends, which often made social occasions awkward. Especially the important ones like Weddings. So it was particularly relaxing coming to live in a Country where people don't give a damn what region,family,school, University, etc., you come from, the accent you use, or the car you drive, but place more importance on who you are .

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Somehow I doubt such a place exist on this planet, but I have not lived the Canadian Life yet, so who am I to judge. It would be quite amazing to have friends which are plumbers and friends which are neuro-scientists and at the same time on the same evening they have a brilliant time together. If Canada is the place for that, then I am quite impressed already.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I've been to those mixed parties.

The next door neighbour to the left are 2 doctors, those to the right are Post People (Canada Post mail delivery not management), just down the road a truck driver, and near him the owner of one of the largest auto repair companies in Canada, and so it goes down the street. Rich man, poor man neighbours, friends....:thumbup::thumbsup::thumbup:

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I always think it's funny when Americans speak of the 'class' thing in the UK as if they don't have the same thing there.

They speak of coming "from the wrong side of the tracks" and "trailer trash" and that's the very same thing.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I have tried to explain to my classmates the difference in the UK class system and Canadian society and I just can't....and it's not for a want of trying.

But all I know, is my children will never have to walk in to a room, the way I have a 1000 times and known the minute they open their mouth they will be pigeon holed in to a class/stereo-type, whatever may happen.

I think the article was excellent Judy, and very pertinent,

All the best and I hope your new location/life is going well,

Thanks
Mrs Miggins x:rofl:

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

mmm I'm not sure this is entirely true ..... here, people will form instant opinions based upon one's appearance of eg "redneck" and also "native". I agree the latter is not so much about class, but it is none-the-less noticeable. :unsure:

I mean, if a guys walks into our office in cowboys boots and a stetson, or checked shirt and baseball cap as opposed to a shirt and tie, you can see people's reactions to them ...

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I'm not saying that all rich Canadians socialize with middle and working class Canadians, but I know that some of them do. For example, I became friends with a woman in Calgary about thirty years ago. Back then she was an ordinary person but, owing to some extremely successful investments, etc., she became a multi-multi-millionaire. When she holds social functions at her house today, some of the guests are rich, and some of them are her hair stylist, gardener, home renovation guy, personal trainer, the maître d' from her favourite restaurant, and sales clerks from her favourite clothes shops. She has a very effervescent personality, and she genuinely befriends the people with whom she does business.

Oh yes, earlier this year, another friend of mine, who is a professor at the University of Calgary, married a skilled tradesperson. By the way, he makes way more money than she does.
x

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

The article explains how the categories are derived.
x

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

This is pretty much my experience too. As someone said to me, it doesn't matter what you do as long as you do something. You are valued for what you contribute to society and not what you have. Someone who earns a modest income but contributes a great deal, for example a fireman, will be seen by many people as deserving of more respect than ... oh , off the top of my head ... someone who is highly educated and wealthy, but adds little.

Like a lawyer.

<ducks>

North Americans use the word "class" in a different way to us. I remember seeing a Ryder Cup golf tournament in the late 70s or early 80s. It was down to the last pair who were Jack Nicklaus and Tony Jacklin. On the last green they were tied. Nicklaus made his par and Jackin was left with a tricky 4 footer to tie the round, and the tournament. Nicklaus told him to pick the ball up. He explained later that he couldn't bear to watch a golfer as good as Tony Jacklin miss a short put to lose the Ryder cup.

Jack Nicklaus has class.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

And, by the way Judy, it is an excellent article. It is just such a shame it is necessary.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Further to this point, I'll save you the long read and point out the relevant sentence from the article:
If you believe it would be helpful to the reader, the sentence could be supplemented with more information. For example, it could be explained that a person's class is based on an aggregate of those factors.

A university professor needs a doctorate, enjoys a good deal of prestige and satisfaction if he/she genuinely is interested in his/her field. Depending on his/her reputation, the university professor may have more than an average amount of influence on society. Even if the professor's work is not well known around the world, he/she can expect to inspire his/her students at a minimum. But the professor earns less than a truck driver in Fort McMurray.

The truck driver in Fort McMurray has little influence on society, doesn't need much education, and he/she may or may not enjoy his/her job (and, yes, there are women truck drivers in Fort McMurray). But the compensation is that he/she earns a six figure income.

The article makes the following statement about the middle class:

This group comprises 40 - 50% of Canada's population. People in this group earn their living from working. However, they tend to have some accumulated wealth (equity in houses that they own, savings towards retirement, etc.).

I thought it went without saying that, because they had accumulated some wealth, they earned enough to have some money left over after they'd paid their basic living expenses.

Some of the articles that I read while I was collecting information for my own article stated that middle class people had jobs that allowed them some autonomy, that gave them some independence in figuring out how they would do things, that earned them respect in society, and so on. These factors tended to be more prevalent in the forms of employment that the upper middle class undertook, but also were present in the jobs of the lower middle class.

Since I was trying to keep the article to a reasonable length, I didn't think it was necessary to comment on the level of job satisfaction that the middle class enjoyed. I thought it was obvious from the introductory comments to that section that the level of autonomy, interest, satisfaction and prestige was at its maximum at the top of the food chain and at its minimum at the bottom of the food chain.

But if you think it would help readers of the article if that was spelled out, I could add it.

The section on the Average Middle Class, Middle Middle Class or Lower Middle Class also contained this paragraph that I considered to be important:
If you start researching this topic, you quickly get entangled in the different opinions of different sociologists. There isn't any one way to define class. As the article stated:
As the article also stated, the average Canadian's understanding of class is different from a sociologist's analysis. The average Canadian regards 90% of the population as middle class.

The typical understanding in Canada is that a middle class person is one who works for a living. He/she does not have sufficient capital that he/she can live solely from the interest on that capital. He/she also is not so incapacitated that he/she cannot work and has to live off welfare.

My primary intention in writing the article was to provide members of the forum who still were living in the UK a rough guide to class in Canada. The reason is that the English definition of middle class is unique in the world. In Southern Africa, where I come from, the meaning is roughly equivalent to the North American meaning. The same can be said of Australia, where I also have lived. My research has shown me that middle class even has a different meaning in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. It's only in England that the term middle class has a meaning equivalent to upper middle class everywhere else. That's why I deliberately used the term English English in the article. I did not want to suggest that that unique meaning was universal to all branches of British English.

I was motivated to write the article because fledermaus's interactions with me in another thread made me realize that, until yesterday, I'd unthinkingly used "middle class" in its worldwide sense on this forum. I would tell people that their children's schooling most likely would be fine if they chose a decent, middle class neighbourhood. So what I'd been telling them all along, according to their understanding, was that their children's schooling most likely would be fine if they chose a decent, upper middle class neighbourhood. That had been the opposite of my intention!

My primary intention in the article was to convey to British readers the feeling that the discussion of class engenders in Canadians. Generally speaking, it is a much less potent term in Canada, from an emotional point of view.

The egalitarian nature of Canadian society has been a huge relief to me. During the era in which I lived in Southern Africa, whites had an automatic advantage in an incredibly elitist set up. I was crushed by guilt when I lived there, and it felt enormously liberating to escape from that.

But, oh, I've digressed. I was telling you how I wanted to convey to British readers the feeling of the word, class, in Canada rather than an intellectual explanation. On the other hand, I felt that I couldn't confine it to an emotional discussion, but needed to provide some rational information as well. Yet I didn't want to overdo the logical part. Basically I wanted to keep the discussion primarily qualitative rather than quantitative.

Still, if you think there really is something missing from the article and that should be added for the sake of clarification, let's discuss it.
x

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Well done Judy. I grew up in South Africa and lived in the UK for 14 years. IMHO you got it spot on.

Rob. ;)

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Did you not find that in England as well?

On the lawyer thing, no-one cared about the fact that I was a lawyer in England, it was just another job....

However, in Canada, the opposite is true, I never experienced the "instant deference" that I am given here by Canadians, in England.

I think most of us are talking about the historical class system in England, something that, in my opinion, just doesn't exist today.

When Mrs Miggins talked about accents, I would respond by saying that someone from Newfoundland would experience exactly the same thing in Alberta.

I do not speak with a Etonian type accent, and I knew lots of lawyers in England that spoke with typical Scouse or Newcastle accents. Because they were articulate and intelligent, no-one thought any less of them because of the way they spoke just like, if some "Nice but dim Tim" type walked into the room and opened his/her mouth, everyone realised within a minute or two what they really were and reacted accordingly.

As I said earlier, in my experience the "class issue" in England was limited solely to Pringle wearing, Volvo drivers.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Good Job, Judy:thumbup:

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I think this post misses the essence of the British class system, both a neuro-scientist and a plumber are in trade. I happen to know a British neuro-scientist here, in Toronto, and am quite sure that his parents were the sort of people who purchased their furniture. One might say that one is middle class and the other working class but given the miserly stipend paid to research scientists and the handsome wages brought in by plumbers I'd be at a loss to say which is which.

I think there is a class system in Canada; Lord Black of Crossharbour reached the pinnacle when he moved to England. I don't understand it as I don't have cause to have much contact with the unhyphenated but I think they have means of ranking each other independent of income; that's why people who went to Queen's constantly advise the world that they went to Queen's.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I don't disagree with you as far a a Canadian class system, it's there just not as overt as in the UK.

As for our good buddy Conrad:sneaky:, in order to become a Lord he had to move to the UK and give up his Canadian citizenship.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I like your article Judy. I think it sums up my experience of "class" in Canada.

The important thing to me is that in Canada you can move between classes more easily. You aren't defined by where you come from or by your occupation, which is very often the case in Britain.

My experience of the British class system has shown me that the posher people are the less they care about what you do or how you talk. (As long as you aren't going to marry into their family). I have worked with old school doctors who generally spoke to nurses, radiographers, etc as if we were servants. This was evident in their assumption that they can call me by my first name without me inviting them to, and yet expect me to call them by their title and surname. The younger breed of doctors is different, but they tend to come from more normal backgrounds. It's still unusual for doctors and other ranks to be friends, to socialise out of work. Those doctors who do regard the other ranks as friends tend to be of non British background.

In Britain it usually isnt long before someone asks what you do for a living, or about your family background, your people. Here it's rarely asked, sometimes people dont actually know what their friends do.

I was interested in your comment on professors. At my college in Ontario the teachers referred to themselves as professors. They werent a head of a school, or had their own chair, so I thought that this was the case for Canada. Maybe it's just an Ontario thing?

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

francophone influence? in some of the french speaking areas in europe (at least the ones i have connections deep enough to give me an insight into the school system) teachers on secondary levels are called "professeur" even if they have not an according title.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Doctors in Canada are on piecework, paid by the number of customers they see. This makes them common...

The idea of class and being a professional, (ie someone who isn't an employee with a wage, but someone who has clients referred to them and who can bill those clients for services rendered.) put the kibbosh on both the NHS and the Canadian system. In Saskatechewan the doctors went on strike rather than sign up to be employees of the state in Tommy Douglas' Medicare system. In Britain they only joined the NHS on provided they had time to see private patients and so maintain that elitism.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Yes, I wondered if that was the case.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I find that many people have a hugely over-inflated view of themselves simply because of the profession they are in. I cannot bear it when people qualify themselves by the job that they have....it's just a job! I don't give a damn if someone is a doctor/scientist/teacher/astronaut - that is the job that you do, not who you are.

I work as admin staff in a university, and have to put up with bone-jarringly patronising people sometimes. Some lecturers & academics are lovely, down to earth folks who come into our office for a bit of banter. Generally these are the people who have worked their way up from the bottom. Professors, deans, associate deans - for the most part their heads are completely up their own arse. And it makes me smile to myself, that they work for a living just like me, only they are too full of self induced importance to see it.

I don't give a damn how people view me, but it would be great if Canada was less 'nose-in-the-air' when it comes to occupation & wealth.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Perhaps I saw more of the Class system due to the type of people I had to deal with when I was in the printing industry in the UK.

Newmarket Horse Racing Stud Owners, we used to print "Stud Books" these were very small run but highly priced publications, leather bound, gold embossed sort of things, so I had to deal with the owners themselves.

Cambridge University College types.

Hospitals, dealing with the Consultants.

Possibly the most class orientated people in the World.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I know that area. Six Mile Bottom. Fulbourn etc?

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I don't much deal with Canadians but the status of doctors in the US class system is interesting. My partner's step-father is a hospital doctor, he works for the VA (the world's largest system of socialised medicine) and, within their town, would be seen as an average sort of worker were he not an active lobbyist for the Democrats in a solidly Republican district. Socially he's a bit shunned as a pinko. By contrast, the father of my eldest daughter's boyfriend is head of orthopeadic surgery at a well known clinic in Minnesota, he's as close to being American royalty as a non-Kennedy can be. As someone who makes a million dollars a year he can hold any sort of political view without offending the neighbours.

That someone has an MD tells you dick about them, it's a bit like knowing that someone has a Phd or, indeed, what colour car they like to have.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Indeed, its not what you have, it's what you do with it that counts.

What the MD says also depends on the country. A British MD is a doctorate degree, PhD level. A USA or Canadian MD is a Batchelors degree, similar to the MBBS that UK docs have.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Indeed, in France professeur can mean school teacher, even in a maternelle (1st grade etc.). It's usual to say "professeur d'universite" (properly accented, of course) to mean prof in the US/Canadian sense, and, as appropriate, something like "Professeur et Directeur de Département Universitaire" for the UK sense.

BTW fledermaus, the UK usage of Professor to mean Head of Dept. or Chairholder is dying out. Professors are multiplying like rabbits. When I were lad, there was one Prof per department, now there are 13 (count 'em!) in the department where I did my grad work. There appear to be two reasons for this (1) that when abroad, especially in the US, to be referred to as a lecturer implies lowly, untenured, status and to be referred to as a reader provokes blank stares. (2) lecturer/reader pay scales have a top. If you can get the professor title there are notwithstanding clauses through which you can negotiate a decent salary (if you have the clout).

Of course, needless to say, my job fits the traditional UK definition. ;)

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I'm not sure if I really understand how it all works in Canada yet but I always thought that the American class system was based purely on wealth whereas the British class system was entirely to do with Heritage and had little to do with money. When I was young I once dated a girl who's family were by all accounts "upper class". All their friends had titles of one kind or another and everyone had been to expensive public schools. Her family were farmers and not wealthy ones at that. Even though they put her through public school it must have nearly bankrupted them. But they very much lived the upper-class lifestyle, going shooting and having black-tie dinner parties at weekends. But I very much doubt they would have been upper-class according to the American perspective.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Not quite, history also comes into it, consider the DAR or, in the south, the Daughters of the Confederacy. The ability to trace one's ancestry to the Mayflower provides a considerable measure of social status, at least in the east.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

I think there are as many different definitions of social class in the UK as there are newspaper editors with a spurious point to make or a rag to sell. There's a brilliant, somewhat tongue-in-cheek discussion of the English class system in a book by the social anthropoligist Kate Fox, called "Watching the English." Her basic premise is this: the upper and lower social classes are secure in their status, and all the angst and worry over which class you and your neighbours are in stems from insecurities in the middle classes and, particularly, those on the boundary between one social class and another.

Class, she reckons, is illustrated effectively by your attitudes towards other people, possessions, cars, houses, money (attitudes towards, not possession of - an important distinction... you can be upper-class but poor, or fabulously wealthy but resolutely working class). Fox makes a study of behaviour towards cars as one example of this. People who drive beaten-up bangers full of chocolate wrappers and bits of old string tend to be either working class or upper/upper-middle (the true upper classes, of course, might drive themselves occasionally but have a man to clean the car). Polishing the car on the street every Sunday morning is a defining factor of the upper-working or lower-middle boundary; running it through a carwash every few weeks is characteristic of the middle-middle/upper-middle grouping.

I don't know how, or whether, this relates to Canada. If it does, then my street echoes others' comments here about the juxtaposition of social classes in residential neighbourhoods - we have religious car-polishers, sweet-wrapper-filled mud-caked bangers (and newer models subject to the same disregard), and occasional car-wash users all living cheek-by-jowl. Long may it thus continue!

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Hence my reference to the Pringle wearing Volvo brigade.:thumbsup:

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

indeed - it was your comment that reminded me of the book. And you've put to rest my sudden oh-no-was-that-a-completely-different-book-am-I-losing-my-marbles worry!

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Ahh, of course it does, and with that title you are my second favourite professor.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

[QUOTE=Oakvillian;6914383 Polishing the car on the street every Sunday morning is a defining factor of the upper-working or lower-middle boundary[/QUOTE]

My former neighbour did that, early and for hours. I had always thought it was to get up and out the door before his revolting wife woke up and possibly felt frisky. Now I realise it was all about class.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Which reminds me of a completely different book I was reading in Chapters. It was an American womans view of the British. I think she is a journalist married to a diplomat posted to London. If I could remember what it was called I would get it out of the library. Anyroad, she seemed to have some accurate observations of Britons and class.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

One of the Canadian diplomats I used to work with in London told me that Yes Minister is used as a training aid for people being posted to London.

Re: Social Classes Wiki Article
 

Ah yes. I'd forgotten you have my business e-mail address. Spiffy title, eh?