What is Upper Class? Statistical Analysis by the Brookings Institution.

[nobodyspecial]

Funny - I would consider that chair a design classic now and would probably buy one.

[Threshkin]

How many points do I get for my three black velvet paintings?  One is of dogs playing poker, the second is a unicorn running on clouds and the biggest one is of Elvis!

[pbkmaine]

They are all masterpieces in their own way...

[Jack]

How many points do I get for my three black velvet paintings?  One is of dogs playing poker, the second is a unicorn running on clouds and the biggest one is of Elvis!

At that point you have to start deducting points from your neighbors' living rooms too, just for being in close proximity to yours!

[Playing with Fire UK]

This is fascinating reading for someone from the UK. An amazing book is Kate Fox's "Watching the English." Fox is a social anthropologist and explains the quaint English ways from an outsider point of view. Bill Bryson's 'Notes from a Small Island' is also fun.

In the UK then class is 90% about what class your parents are. Accents, class shibboleths (see U and nonU English on wikipedia), what kind of school you went to all have much more impact on what class people see you as than how much you earn now, and there is practically no influence from how much wealth you've accumulated or destroyed.

[pbkmaine]

Playing with Fire: I know many people in the U.S. think that anyone with a UK accent is posh. How do people in the UK regard Americans in their midst? Are we all lumped together, too?

[Playing with Fire UK]

pbkmaine: It depends a lot on who you ask. I think that with the US based TV we have a better idea of variation, but there are still plenty of people convinced that :

- All Amercans are brash and rude
- Everyone in the US brings a gun to work/school
- If you've met a nice American, they're Canadian
- Call said Canadian American, and they will cease to be nice
- Everyone in the US is or looks like a model

I've also heard some pretty crazy ideas (asking someone living in NYC do they have a ranch). When I was a waitress I assumed that every American I served was a) wealthy and b) tipped like money was water. Due to (what I now presume to be) self selection, it actually worked out well for me. 

[FatCat]

- Everyone in the US is or looks like a model

Really? I thought we had a reputation for being overweight and out of shape.

[nobodyspecial]

- Everyone in the US is or looks like a model

Really? I thought we had a reputation for being overweight and out of shape.

Not on TV.
Also anybody working as a poet or in a coffee shop can afford a $MM apartment in Manhattan

[Playing with Fire UK]

Ah yes, I'd forgotten all the massively overweight people. Yes, I guess that is another sterotype, we get a lot of 'documentaries' and massive weight loss shows from your side of the Atlantic. But I very rarely see people of an average weight on TV.

Re: working in a coffee shop and living in Manhatten, did you see the thread on which TV characters could actually afford their lifestyles?

[Jack]

Ah yes, I'd forgotten all the massively overweight people. Yes, I guess that is another sterotype, we get a lot of 'documentaries' and massive weight loss shows from your side of the Atlantic.

Isn't the UK a close second in that regard anyway? When I think of obesity documentaries, the first person that comes to mind is Jamie Oliver...

[Playing with Fire UK]

Absolutely, and we are getting fatter at a faster rate than most US states, so could be overtaking you soon (on the scales, not bikes).

I can't remember where I saw it but there was a study done showing that watching docu-horrors about people who are overweight, poor, stressed etc actually makes the viewers less likely to take positive action, because it normalises such unhealthy behaviour. The majority of people will be doing well compared to the person on the TV so underestimate the scale of their problems.

[sorry if that previous comment came across as rude, it wasn't intended]

[Jenni]

I got 101 thanks to a lot of older furniture, bookshelves, and the books stacked on the floor part.

The wealthiest people I knew were my grandparents, who were frugal farmers of the Millionaire Next Door variety. Probably knowing the Cluttérs whose murders were in IN Cold Blood may have influenced a lack of interest in being showy as well.

[boarder42]

I see nothing of how much a living room stripper pole gets you. Since I scored-20. And I come from doctors and will be retired by 35. I'm gonna count the stripper pole as 280 

[Squirrel away]

The wealthiest people I knew were my grandparents, who were frugal farmers of the Millionaire Next Door variety. Probably knowing the Cluttérs whose murders were in IN Cold Blood may have influenced a lack of interest in being showy as well.

Really? I was just reading about that book a few days ago.

[Jenni]

From what my mom told me they weren't friends but knew them from 4-H etc. They would have lived around 60 miles away, but been about the same age and demo. I haven't read a lot about the Clutters other than in a bio of Harper Lee because I am paranoid enough, living 20 miles from a town.

But I think mostly that's just not how things were done. Farming has always been a high asset, low cash thing. Someday I will write an epic post about them & their kids, the successful daughters and the economic outpatient sons.

[Shinplaster]

Lose points for not having periodicals strewn all over your coffee table?  Who has those things at all, never mind displayed as some decoration that adds 'class'?    Parquet flooring means something different here than it does in Europe.  I don't know anyone that would choose what is sold as parquet here over normal hardwood - it is not an asset.

And if someone offered me an authentic Eames chair, I would snap it up in a heartbeat!

I guess that explains why we scored 'prole'.