What makes you feel working class?

Most British adults like to call themselves working class even though half of them fit the middle class definition, Mori research has shown.

The popular sentiment shows a shift in thinking, as in 1994 only 51% felt they were working class compared with 68% today.

And despite more people thinking they belong to it, the social group has actually shrunk in size.

Working class men live off their skills and wits instead of their education and women live near to their mothers and share childcare with them, according to former Labour MP Joe Ashton's definition.

It's fashionable to be anti-establishment and speak with an accent and we're influenced by working class role models like Jonathan Ross and Ben Elton, says sociologist Professor Richard Scase.

What makes you feel working class? Why do we want to be working class? What makes it fashionable? Are class perceptions influenced by a Labour government?

This debate is now closed.

---

Your reaction

Accepting the 2% wage rise

Gerry, UK

What makes me feel working class? Well perhaps the sheer exhaustion from the late hours, sitting in overcrowded public transport, accepting the 2% wage rise whilst watching our director whizz past in his top of the range company car whilst enjoying his "You've got to pay the going rate" 25% wage rise.
Gerry, UK

FEELING working class does not make one working class. It is strange to think that tomorrow's TV comedies will be about a middle class woman called Bouquet who wants to keep up appearances by speaking with an estuary accent and being known as Mrs Bucket.
Michael, UK

Class definition becomes less important as we move towards a society that uses purchasing power to distinguish between its citizens. Instead, behaviour and values will increasingly be used to judge a person's inclusion in a social grouping. As these concepts are more easily learned, what has traditionally been known as 'class mobility' will increase, and will explain why some middle class people 'learn' what have historically been known as working class values.
Arran, Edinburgh

This is a survey about how people perceive class and its implications

Austin, UK

This is really about how you define what class someone is in. The popular concept at the moment is that working class means you are honest, down-to-earth, unpretentious and hardworking so obviously people like to consider themselves in that group. To others middle class would mean well-educated and gainfully employed, so they would like to think of themselves as that. Really this is a survey about how people perceive class and its implications. Once accents would have been a definite sign, times change - my educated home counties drawl leads people around where I live now leads them to assume that I am gay.
Austin, UK

May I offer an alternative definition of working class? If you work for an organisation or person, they pay you a wage and can terminate your employment, you are working class. This does away with differences of income, education, accent et al.
Alan Greaves, England

I'm bored of hearing people bleat, "I work so I must be working class." Barristers and captains of industry also work but are they working class? I don't think so. In my experience, most people who passionately claim to be "working class" are hoping that you will congratulate them on having made a huge success of their lives despite humble beginnings.
Helen, England

I am unemployed, so I can't be working class. I am not average, so I can't be middle class. Therefore I can only assume one is upper class. Innit?
Charles, UK

Over the last 100 years, my family has included a Duke, a military general, a Raj Commander, an Eastern European refugee, a fishwife, a char, a soldier, a policeman, a miner, a ship builder, a baker, two clergy and a doctor. What class does this make me? Who cares?!
Gordon, UK

Class-hatred rhetoric holds us back from becoming a "grown up" country!

Stephen Hayes, England

My father left school at 14 and spent most of his working life driving lorries, I was born in the sound of Bow bells in a condemned slum. My mother worked dressing shop windows. I qualified as a doctor. I have voted for Wilson, Heath, Thatcher, Kinnock, Blair and Lib Dem, also UKIP and Green. At the next election I will choose who to vote for then. What class does that make me? More importantly, who cares? Down with the regressive Marxoid class-hatred rhetoric that holds us back from becoming a "grown up" country!
Stephen Hayes, England

What class am I in? I'm in a class of my own
Chris, UK

Perhaps class is now just someone's view of themselves and their attitudes, rather than what they do for a living or whether they went to university. If it means that more of us feel that nobody is better than anyone else by virtue of their accent or bank balance, then it can only be a good thing in my view.
David, UK

I don't think the class system really does exist anymore, it's just an idea to play around with. If it did exist you wouldn't be asked what class you thought you were in, you would be told.
Mark Sims, England

We need to adjust our definitions to suit the complexity of modern society

Luke, UK

I grew up with no TV and one (ancient) car. Went to state school, then university (thanks to intelligence not class). Currently live in a rented room with no cash to splash around, no car, no holidays, no TV. BUT I go to the theatre, the university I went to was Oxford and I speak with no regional accent. What am I? I'm sick of being accused of being "posh". We need to adjust our definitions to suit the complexity of modern society and eradicate snobbery, particularly of this ridiculous inverted kind.
Luke, UK

Middle class is an enigma, a fallacy, a label. There has really only ever been two classes, the ones who have to work for money and the ones where money works for them. However it is still like chasing the wind because we all going to meet the same fate what ever class you chose or have been chosen to be.
John, UK

I have a middle class job (teaching) but live in a working class area where I was born and raised. I have middle class tastes (I own a large number of books and love classical music) yet have, I'm told, a working class accent. Am I middle class or working class? Neither - I am ME!
Philip, England

To go back to the original question, yes class perceptions are influenced by Labour governments. This is because, rather like the Bolshevik revolutionaries of old, most New Labour politicians come from privileged backgrounds, but feign working class roots in order to fit in with the "workers" (and win votes off them of course).
Peter, UK

This is part of the national psyche, just like when at school in this country it is uncool to get top grades yet cool and rebellious to fail miserably.
Steve, UK

Life is more than trying to recreate Provence in a suburban kitchen

Stu, UK

Recognising that quality of life is more than buying a new Aga and trying to recreate Provence in a suburban kitchen. Quality of life comes from community, friends, family and a decent local pub - working class stuff. Many people give up these things (especially brainwashed university graduates) and swap social capital for financial capital so as to pursue more 'things' and do more 'stuff' to make them happy. It doesn't work.
Stu, UK

If any of the inverted snobs who call themselves working class nowadays described their lives to my late grandfather, a former miner, firstly he'd be envious beyond belief and secondly disappointed that they did not want to aspire to anything more.
Carl, England

I am proud to think of myself as middle class. I am well educated and earn a good living. I believe class is down to the way a person behaves and the attitudes they have. Why would anyone want to think of themselves as part of a lower class that is associated with teenage mothers living off the state and uneducated individuals working in lower grade jobs?
Jane, UK

Most of the working class souls I encounter are unskilled and witless

Chris B, England

Joe Ashton has a quaint and Dickensian impression of what working class means! Far from being skilled and living off their wits, most of the working class souls that I encounter are unskilled and witless. Conversely, a distinguished consultant cardio-vascular surgeon whom I know is highly skilled, lives off his wits, and lives a stone's throw from his mother - which, according to Joe Ashton, makes him working class.
Chris B, England

Whilst at Cambridge I saw no shame in being lower middle class, yet was derided by inversely snobby fellow students who claimed to be working class. I have no doubts of their working class roots, but surely once you have enjoyed the opportunities offered to you by a Cambridge degree any claims to being the repressed underclass are insulting to those genuinely working hard in tough and poorly paid jobs to support their families, with few other options?
Micha, UK

Only middle class people are obsessed with being working class anyway.
Rob, Wales

Our prime minister changing his accent depending on his audience is pretty pathetic

Ben, England

I probably did when I was 15, at least when going to football matches in London. But it seems puerile to me to keep pretending in later life. To watch our prime minister changing his accent depending on his audience is a pretty pathetic sight.
Ben, England

I am a foreigner living in the UK for five years now. I love it here and can't imagine living anywhere else. However, the one thing that is an absolute mystery to me is the class system. How can grown up people actually spend so much time discussing which class they are or other people are? In many conversations I have been part of if the word upper class, middle class or working class was substituted with the word black person, or foreigner you would probably be instantly arrested. It's very, very odd and outdated.
Mark, Scotland

Better to be a geezer, wheeling and dealing, following in Del Boy's footsteps

Mark Davies, UK

Joe Ashton insinuates that living off your education is a bad thing - it is much better to be a bit of a geezer, wheeling and dealing, following in Del Boy's footsteps. This is fine if we want a country of market traders instead of teachers, doctors, scientists etc. This kind of comment does not help persuade young people that staying in school is a good idea, and leads to the inverted snobbery that forces us Brits to kick anyone who has done well.
Mark Davies, UK

You cannot climb the class ladder, it is something that you are born with and die with. It's a birthright. If my salary was to increase tenfold, I would still be working class. I was brought up on a council estate, and my parents worked in factories. I have since got a degree and have a good job, but I am working class. Middle class people have horses and go shooting and play croquet !
Lou H, England

Middle class heroes anyone - Tim from Big Brother?
Alan Partridge?

Jonny, Scotland

Why would anyone want to be middle class? Talking about nothing but mortgages and how their new Ikea lamp "really sets off the room"? Middle class heroes anyone - Hyacinth Bucket? Tim from Big Brother? Alan Partridge? Margaret Thatcher? Jamie Oliver? No thanks, mate.
Jonny, Scotland

I was educated at private school and have a BSc, an MSc and a PhD. I own a house, have a company car and take regular foreign holidays. I read a broadsheet paper, and do not have satellite TV. I watch rugby and not football. Both my parents are graduates, as are my brother and my wife. And yet in London I am often regarded as working class due to my northern accent.
John Franklin, UK

Ben Elton working class? Come off it! He built a whole career around his 'man of the people' persona, but in reality he is a nice wholesome middle class lad with a famous academic for a father. If you are looking for working-class role models, try someone like Sir Alex Ferguson.
Brian Eves, UK

I always like the comment "Those who talk about class, have none."
Fred Elliot, UK

We're all lower class subjects, as long as we tolerate the monarchy.
Andy, UK

I'm a student at the LSE and on my first day of a sociology course the lecturer asked those who thought they were working class to stand up - almost 2/3 of the room stood up - he then pointed out that they were talking utter rubbish and that to be at LSE you were blatantly middle class. While there is probably an element of truth to that, does it really matter?
Sarah, London, UK

I was bought up in working class Neasden by parents who thought education was important. Ever since I've realised that a belief in education is the single biggest separator between the two classes. Academic children are definitely discriminated against in working class society. I've lived in other cultures, notably Germany, where this doesn't apply. There everybody thinks education is a good thing. There is far more social mobility as a result.
Andy Edmonds, England

Just like Jamie Oliver is a cockney?

Seamus, UK

Ben Elton and Jonathan Ross working class? Just like Jamie Oliver is a cockney? The real working class are the only ones who don't feel it is cool to be so as we cannot afford to live in a decent manner.
Seamus, UK

Working class is only fashionable when you can afford it. Otherwise, for those who genuinely meet the criteria, it often means reduced life opportunities through lack of money and lack of education: Not desirable and certainly not fashionable. Those with money and education can be fashionably working class. But of course, they're only pretending.
Chris Parker, Germany (UK really)

Surely the definition applies to how you were brought up, not what you are now?
Kieron, Germany

I don't worry about whether I should say 'toilet' or 'serviette'

Jim Allen, Scotland

I consider myself to be working class because my job involves producing something concrete rather than sitting behind a desk moving paper around. I live in a rented flat not a semi with a mortgage my grandchildren will have problems paying. I wear jeans and a t-shirt all the time, and I don't worry about whether I should say "toilet" or "serviette".
Jim Allen, Scotland

The British obsession with class in a society where it is meaningless is one of the big sources of social division today. Time our nation grew up, I think.
Simon Richardson, UK

Carpenters, electricians, plumbers are all probably considered to be working class in the definition above. However, a carpenter learns his trade as an apprentice - it's all education in my book. What's the difference between learning your skills from a tradesman or teacher/lecturer? I think the working class has all but ceased to exist.
David, UK

I have to hide my background by masking my accent

Tim, UK

I am public school and university educated. Unfortunately, I regularly have to hide my background by masking my accent. Whether I am taking a cab, shopping or ordering a drink in a pub, I have found a degree of discrimination if I use my real accent and do not splatter my conversation with "mate" or "cheers". It has also been a problem in interviews, as well, with more people being put-off by the Queen's English than discriminate in favour of it.
Tim, UK

I do not feel working class, I do not want to be working class, and if it is fashionable to be working class, I am too much of an individual to follow the herd. If class perceptions are fashioned by a Labour government, maybe it is because so many of our 'beloved' rulers come from such privileged backgrounds that they feel embarrassed.
Marie Cameron, UK

I am a graduate and houseowner but think of myself as working class

Lesley, Scotland

I've always thought of myself as working class and am proud of it. My dad was a coal miner and my mum a housewife. We lived in a council house throughout my childhood and my parents are still there. I am now a graduate and a houseowner, but I still think of myself as working class, perhaps because of the values instilled in me by my parents. I see no need to aspire to middle class-dom. I am proud to be a 'working class achiever'.
Lesley, Scotland

Class is one of those things that baffles me - how do you know what class you fit into? I know I don't have a clue.
Gillian, Northern Ireland

Why would anyone want to be working class?

Ed, UK

Why would anyone want to be working class? Surely everyone with any sort of pride or self worth aspires to become middle or upper class? Whoever could be proud of themselves in a dead end job, living on a council estate and claiming off the state? People who claim to be proud of being working class seem to me to be the ones who have accepted that they are failures.
Ed, UK

My dad is a bus driver, my mum used to work in a factory, I am working class and proud. I support the idea of unions, the ideals of fair wages and employee rights. The idea that being middle class is going out of fashion is quite scary. Where were all these so-called working class people when Thatcher spent the 80s destroying the country?
vish, UK

This is just victim mentality shining through. The cliche of "fighting against all odds" to succeed is still admired. Even those who have enough money to live comfortably would rather portray themselves as a working class hero done good.
Matt, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

I come from an aristocratic background

Louisa Morgan, UK

I come from an aristocratic background - my family used to own Tredegar House in Wales but lost all their money. I now consider myself to be working class - I married a man from Yorkshire, trained to be a nurse and live in a small terraced house. I could give myself airs and graces and pretend to be upper class but at the end of the day I'm living a working class life so that must be what I am.
Louisa Morgan, UK

Is it really necessary to fit each individual into some class category? I work for a living, am not laden with cash, do not have any pretences about my social standing, but due to my reasonable income, probably would be considered working class. It's about time we started moving away from these social stigma's of what we're supposed to be and face the fact that we're all British, all equal, and proud of it!
Mitch, UK

Working class is being short of money, plain and simple

Lu, England

Class isn't easy to define in this country anymore. Nowadays the divide is less class based and more a clear divide between rich and poor people. With greater numbers getting educated to a higher standard the working class element doesn't really apply any more. I know lots of people who say there working class but have money for holidays, cars etc. Working class is being short of money, plain and simple.
Lu, England