middle class

¹

[mid-l klas]

noun

1. the social, economic, and cultural class of people thought of as having approximately average status, income, education, tastes, and the like.

   Life for the middle class includes going to college, getting a job, getting married, buying a house, and raising kids.

   We intend to put an end to the tax squeeze on the middle class.

2. Sociology.,  Sometimes middle classes the socioeconomic stratum intermediate between the upper or aristocratic class and the laboring class, made up mostly of business people, professionals, civil servants, and skilled workers, and sometimes further subdivided into the upper middle class and the lower middle class.

   In the 1950s and 1960s in America, an emphasis on education increased upward mobility, and the middle class expanded.

   Self-improvement, a strong work ethic, and modesty were among the core moral values of the German middle classes of the early 20th century.

3. any intermediate class.

middle-class

²

[mid-l-klas, -klahs]

adjective

1. of, relating to, or characteristic of the middle class; bourgeois.

   middle-class taste; middle-class morality.

middle class

noun

1. Also called: bourgeoisie. a social stratum that is not clearly defined but is positioned between the lower and upper classes. It consists of businessmen, professional people, etc, along with their families, and is marked by bourgeois values Compare lower class upper class working class

adjective

1. of, relating to, or characteristic of the middle class

middle class

1. A social and economic class composed of those more prosperous than the poor, or lower class, and less wealthy than the upper class. Middle class is sometimes loosely used to refer to the bourgeoisie. In the United States and other industrial countries, the term is often applied to white-collar, as opposed to blue-collar, workers.

Values commonly associated with the middle class include a desire for social respectability and material wealth and an emphasis on the family and education.

Other Word Forms

• middle-classness noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of middle class¹

First recorded in 1760–70

Origin of middle class²

First recorded in 1890–95

Example Sentences

The 1960s middle classes could not afford haute couture, but yearned for a stylish, distinctive look of their own.

From BBC

The author was born in Omaha to Haitian immigrant parents, though Gay stresses that her path “wasn’t particularly difficult in that I grew up middle class and then upper middle class.”

From Los Angeles Times

As confident as China appears on the world stage, President Xi must find a way to keep a burgeoning middle class from worrying about their future.

From BBC

Ali previously told the BBC he wanted to bring a "working class, northern voice" to the Green Party, which he said for a long time had held "a very middle class view".

From BBC

The music press, an industry overwhelmingly drawn from the upper middle class, struggled to reconcile it.

From Los Angeles Times