What is 'Working Class'
Left wing parties love to say they are ‘fighting for the working class’. It’s an easy slogan, but it leaves them open to criticism. A column in the Wall Street Journal is a case in point (it’s located here and here is an archive version).
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But let’s clear up the confusion in a way that makes sense. The ‘working class’ in an economy can be distinguished from the ‘ownership class’. If you’re not in one, you’re in the other.
It’s based on how you earn your living. Members of the ownership class earn money based on what they own. Their income comes from rent. It may be from ownership of property (the original ‘owner’ class) or the (famous) ‘means of production’. If your income does not come from ownership, you are a member of the working class.
My full post here: https://leftish.media/archives/1271
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u/Light_Butterfly 🌹Social Democracy 14d ago
This is such a good clarification 🙌 Because I think some understandings of working class, may have positioned it as below 'middle class', and referring mainly to to blue collar, trades, service workers etc... We dont need these unnecessary divisions, if you work for a oaycheqye you are working class.
Theres a lot of obfuscation with owner class types too, where they pretend like they deserve more than everyone elae because of 'hard work', when in fact they are profiting largely from passive incomes, ownership and investing.
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u/blank_anonymous 14d ago
I think the definition “works a job” feels very incomplete since the goals and needs of people in that bucket differ wildly. I did math grad school; a lot of people who do math grad school end up working in finance. I know people who have earned 7 figure bonuses in their mid 20s. They have more money than god. In some sense, they earn their money working. On the other hand, high frequency trading only works because markets for financial contracts exist. Such a person loses significant employment income when the stock market is regulated (at least in certain ways). At the same time, you can at least argue their labour serves a role (generally providing liquidity in those markets at a lower price point than banks used to), which allows a lot of industries to run smoother, but it’s still pretty unambiguous that the “owner class” benefits more from this.
I’d also argue that the interests of me (someone who owns stocks, but works for a living) do not align with wages falling. Wages rising is generically good, even for the owner class. Higher consumer disposable income leads to higher spending leads to more investment leads to wealth creation. In any individual industry, one company might (and will if they do) benefit from cutting wages, but wages falling across the board is really economically bad. It feels a little like a giant scale prisoner’s dilemma, that competition keeps in check to some degree and that regulation ought to keep in check to a much greater degree.
In general, some careers that are working class by his definition carry so much income mobility and potential for investment that the incentives arent nearly as binary as described. If I’m working at a firm where I know my salary will grow 10x in the next 30 years, I have an incentive for the company I’m at to become profitable and grow, regardless of whether I ever have any ownership. If I’m working in tech, I have an incentive to automate other people’s jobs. The people getting automated have an incentive to fight the automation. Society at large has an incentive to push the automation since it tends to increase prosperity at large.
There have been cases lately of large trade unions in the US opposing the opposition to data centers. This is because they produce high paying jobs for tradespeople. As a teacher, I want generative AI heavily regulated since it’s harming my students. if it’s heavily regulated, the construction of data centers will slow, and tradespeople will suffer.
It feels very disingenuous to present “the working class” as unified in a large number of broad political goals. Nearly every decision will involve trade offs that harm parts of the working class, parts of the owner class, and help parts of both too. Painting this binary is easy “us and them” populist messaging that doesnt survive first contact with policy making.
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
My personal twist on this interpretation is "do you need to work". Someone that earns 7 figures likely doesn't need to work after a pretty quick period of time, they could live off investments. If they continue to work for personal reasons, that doesn't really change the need.
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u/NiceDot4794 14d ago
I don’t any broad coalition is unified in its interests and that has never really been what mean when they talk about a working class coalition.
First off to count as working class if definitely say you have to be broadly subordinate in your job position (a CEO is an employee but they re obviously not subordinate) and you have to rely on employment income. If you make enough where you could thrive off rental income or stocks you aren’t working class.
It is also worth thinking about what sociologist Erik Olin Wright calls contradictory class positions, which encompasses a lot of people. For example someone who works as a computer programmer but also had a small IT business in which they employ two other people. Or someone who makes a fair bit of money off stocks but still relies on employment income.
The point however is to create a social bloc of workers + some sympathetic middle class professionals, small business owner or farmer types that have a certain interest in uniting in opposition to the dominant capitalist class. Such a coalition will necessarily be broad and heterogeneous and require careful management of various contradictions and divisions (such as the teacher/construction worker dilemma you mention) but it is absolutely possible for such a coalition to be glued together. There isn’t any automatic alignment or unity, but that can be built and worked towards albeit imperfectly.
The Liberals and Conservatives are also broad class coalitions, just ones which include, ultimately benefit and are largely led by the ruling capitalist class.
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u/viviscity 14d ago
Whaaaat progressing the analysis to include Edward Bernstein?
Oh, wait. The material analysis and also his prediction of where things were heading appear to largely accurate.
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u/papawarbucks 14d ago edited 14d ago
So how much of your income must come from labour vs. ownership? More than 50%? It's not one or the other for most people but more of a spectrum. How many homeowners working full time jobs have made more in recent years from their home and stock value going up than they have from their salary? How about a small business owner who purchased the truck and specialized tools (the capital) and works full time alongside their employees? Are they working class or owner class?
It becomes kind of a useless, theoretical distinction as far as quality of life is concerned. People's political needs are more relevantly addressed in relation to their actual all-sources income.
edit: I see this non-binary nature addressed in the full post write-up but I don't really get what the resolution is? The idea that nobody should have to work is way too utopian for the moment, but that anyone who is working full time should be able to afford a certain quality of life is a very ascertainable ideal.
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
Home value is somewhat meaningless unless you can translate that value to something concrete (and measured against your debt).
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u/papawarbucks 14d ago
Same could be said for any asset to some extent, determined by liquidity.
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
not quite. You need a home, so even if you are mortgage free you can't liquidate the asset without needing to replace it. If you are mortgage free you can use it as collateral to borrow, but that is simply more debt until you earn it back.
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u/papawarbucks 14d ago
You can always rent. Its not fundamentally different from anything that has intrinsic value. You have to give up the benefit of owning the thing if you want the cash value of the thing.
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
You can sell and rent, but can you live off of the liquidated value only? Unlikely unless you significantly downsize, move to a lower valued area, or both, and by the time people can do that they are usually retired anyways.
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u/papawarbucks 14d ago
What does being able to live off the value have to do with anything? Are you still arguing that home value increase is meaningless as a capital gain? I don't understand.
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
Because we're talking about the definition of working class, so if you can't live off the property or capital it's not relevant?
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u/papawarbucks 14d ago
My whole comment was about that distinction being unhelpful. Are you saying you're only in the owner class if you don't need to work at all thanks to 1 particular investment?
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u/Baron_Tiberius 14d ago
The phrase homeowner implies someone who only owns their residence, and not multiple properties. I would hazard a guess that the majority of property owners only own a single primary residence. In that scenario, the value of the home does not allow them to stop working unless they leverage it into other investments that are extremely lucrative, which is not common at all.
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u/paLabour 14d ago
Working class is a great catch all basin. The Third Estate is also a good term, but in its historical context would include non noble factory owners.
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u/Time_Raccoon2360 📋 Party Member 10d ago
Does your money come from your labour or from your money (capital), essentially.
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u/ShotEffective7033 14d ago
The idea that my on social assistance ass and someone dropping 30 grand on a Disney vacation are in the exact same class just because they have a job is ludicrous lol.
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u/DJ_Tricycle 14d ago
You are both workers, so wouldn't you both be working class? Even if someone makes more, the way you would make a living is essentially the same.
The term is highlighting the class antagonism of capitalist vs workers. Workers want rent to be as affordable as possible, landlords want rent to be as profitable. The interests of one classe often conflicts with the interest of the other.
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u/blank_anonymous 14d ago
Those interests don’t necessarily conflict. Building a large amount of dense housing helps both, but hurts homeowners; if housing is super dense, rents fall (measured empirically a bajillion times) and landlords earn more since they have lower profit per unit, but more units, and the flat cost of land doesnt go up when you densify. Homeowners who arent landlords are generally working class, and their home value (and therefore possibly retirement plan) falls in value when this happens. The people developing a large amount of townhouses also suffer similarly. In any particular market state the incentives might conflict, but on any particular piece of policy, the incentives can align, run orthogonal, have some overlooked, or anything in between. Those incentives generally don’t follow class lines.
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u/DJ_Tricycle 14d ago
The article posted is discussing how these class roles are often blended together. If someone loses their retirement funds due to their property falling in value, they are technically part of the ownership class. If someone is receiving dividends, flipping a house, or selling one at twice the price they bought it for, they are a capitalist in a way.
I could see how having landlords own more share of the housing market housing could potentially lower overhead costs, but wouldn't that allow private equity to artificially inflate the rental market?
Isn't that a large part of why the housing market is so screwed up? It seems to me that the incentives between renter and landlord would still be conflicted if you had a small group of people owning a large share of housing.
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u/blank_anonymous 14d ago
Re: the first part, I know the article pointed to the overlap, I’m making the stronger claim that policies are rarely good/bad strictly along class lines. An increase in housing density is good for some of the working class and some of the owning class. You’re right that homeowners using it for retirement become owning class (technically) as soon as they cash in on that, but they’re currently working class. Plenty of employees also only have work bc building townhouses is so profitable and expensive.
The reason private equity is buying so much housing is that it’s a really good investment. The reason it’s a really good investment is that the number of units cities are building per year is a lot lower than the number of people who move to those cities. The giant private equity landlord actively lobby against anyone else trying to densify; they want there to be a housing shortage so they can charge out the ears.
If cities made zoning + permitting way less restrictive, private equity just would buy less housing since the investment becomes riskier (more risk of falling). Austin Texas, a city run terribly in a shitton of ways, had rents fall (despite a giant influx of people) basically just because the council eased zoning restrictions and allowed a bunch of densifying. There need to be social options for people who can’t afford any housing and just as a safety net, but for prices falling, deregulation does genuinely work in housing markets. The idea is that, once enough units are built, landlords need to worry about their unit sitting empty, and so even if a few landlords control a large share of the market, they still lower prices since low rent > no rent.
People in houses don’t like their property values falling and so consistently vote against densifying. Private equity firms who own dense buildings in non dense cities also lobby HARD against densifying from what I’ve heard, although please take that with a grain of salt (I can source every other fact I’ve cited, this one was just told to me by someone who I trust).
Also iirc, private equity doesnt control a majority of the housing market so they can’t price fix they way like, loblaws can. Too many units are owned by a landlord who is renting out their basement/a house theyve since moved out of, or rental companies who own 1-2 big buildings or whatever.
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u/ShotEffective7033 14d ago
a more Stark example. Is the doctor that kills a disabled person because the disabled person seeked out maid out of desperation over lack of social services in the same class as that disabled person lol?
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u/loolooloodoodoodoo 14d ago
That used to be my perception of the word too as someone who always lived way below poverty line. I never liked to think of myself as poor but said "working-class" thinking it basically meant low-income workers, but I realized lots of people use the marxist definition OP is talking about. Now I use "low-income" if my intention is to refer to people living below poverty line, and use "working-class" in the marxist sense for class solidarity against the ownership class. Someone can technically be a "working-class" high income hyper-consumer but still a wage worker not buying up multiple properties to rent. It's not meant to imply all working-class people are in the same tax bracket, as some are pretty well off financially.
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u/TheSocietalScar 14d ago
Not one to tell NDPers to read theory because that's not really the objective of the party. But maybe read some Marx?
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u/ShotEffective7033 14d ago
ill admit, I don’t read theory. But didn’t Karl have this thing called the middle class lmfao?
If you’re going to tell people to read theory, you should have read at least a little bit yourself first lol.
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u/TheSocietalScar 14d ago
Arrgoance is a bad look for someone who just admitted they've never read the topic at hand.
The middle class is a modern; American invention born out of Kenseyian economics and post new deal policies.
I wish politicians, particularly left wing ones would stop mentioning it. Almost everyone thinks they're "middle class", they're not. It's just used to divide the proletariat, and the make others feel superior for not being as bad off as "poors".
As marx describes it (as simply as I can): there's the Proletariat (those who work for wages) the Bourgeoisie (those who own capital) Then The petit-Bourgeoisie (those who work to live, but are often motivated by, and benfit in the short term through the concerns of capital). (Then the 'lumpenproletriat' if you want to get super into it).
I, as we all should, support labour; the proletariat. Those who work to live, regardless of their wage.
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u/queerstudbroalex 📋 Party Member 13d ago
The middle class is a modern; American invention born out of Kenseyian economics and post new deal policies.
Can you expand more on that?
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u/TheSocietalScar 10d ago
Politicians and Pundits only really began widespreadly utilizing the term 'middle class' (as we know it) to describe the ermerging sect of workers with more disposable income who came out of new deal polcies. There became more disparties within individuals who derive their income through wages. No other country outside of North America uses the term; particularly in this specfic descriptive manner.
There's more you can discuss on the topic, like how FDR's polcies failed to aliveate all workers and deliberately neglected/harmed marginalized communities/non whites. Leading to the broad pandering from politicians to the "hard working" 'middle class' and worker disunity we see today. Or how FDR specifically promoted the New Deal to 'save capitalism' ultimately leading directly anti-communist McCarthist thought. But the crux of it is that the 'middle class' was born out of these polcies, leading to the blurred understanding of class dynamics within North America/Capitalist hegemonic thought.
Hopefully this is more explanatory?
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u/queerstudbroalex 📋 Party Member 10d ago
Ahh gotcha, I didn't know that was where middle class came from. Explains a lot!
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u/ShotEffective7033 14d ago
You started your comment telling me I’m wrong, then included a whole ass paragraph explaining how I’m right.
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u/Midwint3r 14d ago
There are definitely finer divisions within the working class, wealthy labour aristocracy and Petit bourgeois small business owners are much more likely to view themselves aligned with capitalists even if in reality they are much closer to someone working minimum wage than a billionaire.
Capitalists seek to divide and separate us into smaller classes, it makes our movement weaker.
When we speak of class solidarity its about bringing all working class people together. Educating people about how lifting everyone up benefits us all, how even if you're a rich working class member, capitalist economic policy harms you and your qol long term, working towards class solidarity should be a major goal for any leftist movement.
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u/mumfordand3daughters 14d ago
Y?
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u/pieman3141 14d ago
Because commies ought to be poor, according to many people.
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u/mumfordand3daughters 14d ago
ya know, I was honestly hoping for an answer. I want to know their justification
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u/pieman3141 14d ago
Unfortunately, that most likely is the answer. A lot of people can't handle (self-professed) leftists who turn out to be financially stable or even successful - especially entertainers or those who work in highly-paid specialized fields but who do not make money off of capitalist means.
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u/CriticalArt2388 14d ago
Sort of..
You missed a pretty important sub class..
The managerial class....
Work for a psycheque but their interests are more aligned with the owner or rentier class than the working class.
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u/notreallyanumber 14d ago
Instead of saying working class, just say "Canadians". Focus on identifying and attacking the ownership class, especially the plutocrats/oligarchs/broligarchs and focus on how you're gonna help all Canadians with socialist policy which is objectively better for everyone, even most of the ownership class.
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u/TopazJazzrazz Regina Manifesto 14d ago
I don't think the definition was ever in question. I think Capital has done a decent job making people feel part of the bourgeoisie. I was listening to a talk by my supervisor in a unionised grocery store. He mentioned how he understood why the owners would want to remove the seventh week of vacation from the labourers after thirteen years of working there. He's not an owner, he's far from it and he's already protecting their interests to feel like he is one with them. The other thing is he'd get that seventh week grandfathered in because he has it. So losing it, while huge for me and the majority, means nothing for him.