Most Britons to be Middle Class in 2020

The Future Foundation has put out a report on British society in the year 2020, and it makes for troubling reading. Most Britons will be “middle class” by then. How awful.

The report, called “Middle Britain,” notes that in the last 40 years, the percentage of Brits who define themselves as “middle class” has risen from 30 percent to 43percent. The report also notes that there is a certain confusion among the population with about “36 per cent of builders classifying themselves as middle class and 29 per cent of bank managers saying they are working class” according to the report.

Which of course, raises the entire issue of social class in Briton. William Nelson, the author of the report said, “Class difference is not so much about how much money we have, but what we do with it. The defining predictor of being middle-class is ownership of shares and ISAs [British retirement savings accounts] and the accumulation of assets for the future. With people who describe themselves as working-class, the emphasis is on saving up for, or borrowing for, specific purchases or treats.”

The nobility of the proletariat was largely the fiction of the middle class intellectuals who thought coal mining “charming,” train driving “adventurous,” and steel smelting “magical.” The culture of the working class in the UK is a direct function of poverty, exhaustion and limited avenues of advancement. Making the best of hard times, year in and year out, isn’t glorious or poetic. That’s bollocks, mate.

This journal’s target audience is not the middle classes but rather the “lower upper class.” Those on higher rungs of the social ladder don’t read, although looking at the pictures is not beyond the ken of Chauncey Upper-Crust, especially if they involve fox hunting or horses. Disturbingly, the report found fewer than 1 percent of the population defined themselves as upper class. This is exceeding narrow; the skin on top of the soup is thicker. Such a situation will, one expects, prevent the Kensington Review from overtaking Hello! and News of the World in readership. The one nice thing about an elite is its small coziness – welcome.

© Copyright 2006 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.

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