Social Class and World Campuses. Do you want to write a blog post?

Will Barratt, Ph.D.
Global Adventurer

This is an appeal for people from around the world to write blog posts. 

When reviewing the statistics for this blog for the past week I noticed there was a wide geographic range of readership.  While I have experience in higher education in a few countries besides the US, I don't feel well informed enough to comment on what happens sociologically and psychologically on campus.  For example, I currently live in Kuala Lumpur that has a British post-colonial educational system. I can see the British system being replicated here, whether or not it fits the local needs. Not surprisingly class systems are reinforced here through public and private education. Note that here class and ethnicity/national origin are complexly intertwined. And it needs someone more familiar with these systems than I am to write cogently about it.

If you have some insights, comments, personal experiences then please consider writing them for this blog.  I will try to do readability editing that you can check and that is all. I respect all Englishes.

Nationality of blog readers, week ending July 3, 2022

United States  118

United Kingdom  49

Estonia  31

Italy  20

Canada  5

Malaysia  5

Philippines  4

Russia  4

Kazakhstan  3

Indonesia  2

India  2

Kenya  2

Pakistan  2

Azerbaijan  1

Belgium  1

Colombia  1

Germany  1

France  1

Hungary  1

Other  6

Rules of Money and Social Class

Will Barratt, Ph.D.    
Global Adventurer

Simple answers are always inadequate. 

Simple answers often point to complex truths.

 

Food and Social Class This generalization neglects variation, individual preference, availability, and a myriad other issues.  This generalization is the foundation of restaurant marketing in the USA. People in the lower classes like quantity. (Golden Corral) People in the middle classes like quality. (Chili's, Ruth's Chris Steakhouse) People in the upper classes like presentation. (white table cloth and complex place setting)

Money and Social Class

• People in the lower classes see money as survival.
• People in the middle classes see money as life style.
• People in the upper-middle and upper classes see money as an investment opportunity.
• People in the uber-rich class see money as irrelevant.

People in the lower classes see money as survival. 

Attitude toward money

• Views on money are short term. 
• Money is seen as immediately utilitarian.
• Money is about basics; food, housing, transportation. 

Debt/Savings

• Without surplus economic capital, money is something to be used, and used up, so savings and investments are a non-issue. 
• Surplus money, if there is any, is often spent and not saved. 
• Families have some debt, and the banks are hesitant to loan poor people money because of family financial insecurity.
• Many economically disadvantaged live beyond their means by necessity, and not by choice. 
• Those in the lower 40% of US incomes have between $800 and $10,900 in savings in 2019.

Economic Identity

• Survivor.
• Money, because it is scarce, becomes central to their lives and world views.
  
• Very aware of the economics of social class in the economics of daily life
• Aware of their cultural and social disparity with the those in other social classes.  
• Often blame others in higher social classes for their poverty.
  

View of Money and Social Class

• Social class is seen primarily through a lens of economic capital rather than cultural and social capital.
• Lack of money leads to the perception that being in the upper class is about having more than enough money (economic capital).

The Work-Income Game

• Make it to the next paycheck. 
• Identity is focused in staying in the game.
• Winning is not an option. 
• The work and income game is about not losing.

Reality

• Poor people are often one missed paycheck from financial disaster. 
• Hourly, minimum, and low wage low skill jobs are the reality for employment
• Paid daily, weekly, or every two weeks. 
• Unlikely to have any education post high-school.
  
• Probably in the bottom 37.8% with a household  income below USD $50,000 (US Census Table A2)
  

Attributed social class

• Economically disadvantaged people are often blamed for their economic condition. 
• "The great unwashed." "The unwashed masses" are the attitudes of those above them in social class.
  
• According to Ruby Payne those in the lower classes are likely to be criminals and have illegal guns.

People in the middle class see money as life style. 

Attitude toward money

• The view of money is middle term; spend some, save some.
• A mix of moderately well paid hourly and salaried low prestige jobs are employment options.
• Money is to be used for consuming goods, services, and experiences. 
• Things and experiences that money can buy, obviously labeled fashion and branded vacations, are a hallmark of people in this group. 
• Material objects and branded experiences are one way to demonstrate socio-cultural success and status.

Debt/Savings

• Disposable income, money left after necessities are paid, is used for consumption and some for savings.
• Surplus money is sometimes saved and invested. 
• Some people in this group live beyond their means by choice, going into debt for consumer goods, vacations, automobiles, and housing. 
• Have a lot of debt because bankers believe these people can and will pay off their debt.

Economic Identity

• "I am what I own. What I own is who I am."
  
• Aware of social class in their competition with others in their class. 
• Obviously labeled objects and experiences (prestige branding and positional goods) are marketed to people in this group.
  
• Typically unaware of larger social class issues because of their economic winning.

View of Money and Social Class

• Economic capital is important and central to a view of social class.
• Cultural, social, and other forms of capital are of varying importance.
• Identify as about being better than the poor, and emulating people in the social classes above them in their consumer habits.
  

The Work-Income Game

• Doing OK, success is marked by stuff, experiences, and money,

Reality

• Likely middle 28.7% with a household income of USD $50,000 to $100,000  (US Census Table A2)
• May have a college degree, associate's degree, or some post high school education. 
• Likely to have a higher than average debt to income ratio than the poor (because the poor are a high risk for loans) and than the upper-middle class (because of income differences).

Attributed social class

• Conspicuous consumption is often used as a term to describe this group.
• These people have their basic needs met and typically have surplus income which is often used for consumer goods and experiences.   
• Many prestige brands have down-scale products, affordable luxuries, targeting people in this group.
  

People in the upper-middle and upper classes see money as useful tool.

Attitude toward money

• Having surplus wealth (economic, social, and cultural) is a way of life. 
• The view of capital is complex, including economic, cultural, social, and other forms, and long term. 
• Money is a mix of income and wealth.
  
• Prestige consumer goods, often with smaller graphics are a way of life. 
• Advertising economic wealth through obviously labeled fashion is present, but not ubiquitous. 
• "Never spend principle (invested wealth)" is a hard and fast rule.
• Everything can be purchased, even a college degree (as distinct from a college education).

Debt/Savings

• Economic capital is seen as an investment opportunity to gain more economic, social, and cultural wealth. 
• Different forms of capital are converted - economic into cultural, social into economic e.g.
• Long term investments are a way of life, especially in cultural and social capital. 
  

Economic Identity

• Born on 3rd base and think they hit a triple (attributed to many people, most recently notable Ann Richards speaking about George Bush)
• The home group of Karen.
• Often think their unearned privilege is earned and often require respect from others. 
  

View of Money and Social Class

• For those in the upper-middle class there is a failure to see the systematic lack of opportunities and economic oppression of poor people. 
• Social class is as much about cultural (attained through investments in education) and social (it's not who you know, it's who knows you) capital.
  

The Work-Income Game

• These people have already won the work and income game and concentrate on more economic, social, and cultural wealth.
  

Reality

•  Likely top 33.6% in household income of over USD $100.000 (US Census Table A2).
• Typically college graduates, many with professional degrees. 66.5% of college students come from the 35 % of the population who have at least a 4-year college degree. 
• Many high prestige colleges have many legacy students (parents went there).
  
• Make and enforce the rules, thus called the ruling class (by me). 
• Varieties and sub-groups within this class group exists because surplus income allows alternative life styles.
• Mid and high-level luxury prestige goods are heavily marketed to these people because of their disposable income.
• College is an extension of their social class culture, thus normalizing their mono-paradigmatic social class world view.

Attributed social class

• Although from a vastly different time, Thorston Veblein wrote about the "Theory of the leisure class" in 1899. 
• These people are often lauded for their success, but never forget, these people had parents who were also economically, socially, and culturally successful.

For the uber-rich the 1%, money is irrelevant. 

Attitude toward money

• Money is about wealth, not income.
• Money managers take care of their wealth.
• Money can buy anything from college admissions to college educations to politicians.
  

Debt/Savings

• A lot of money 'in the bank'.
• Investments are the source of income.

Reality

•  The 1% rhetoric is about income, these are the people with the wealth to not need income.
• While there were almost 22,000,000 millionaires in the USA in 2020, Forbes estimates there to be 724 billionaires in the USA in 2022.
• There aren't that many of these people, but they get a lot of space in the news universe.
• Big political donors, giving them big personal influence. 
• Have their own PR staff to keep them both in and out of the news.
• Typically born into generational wealth.
• Have no friends outside their own group - insecure in new social relationships, unsure of they are liked for their money or for themselves. 
• Rose to this level by work (the 1% in income, CEOs, tech entrepreneurs) or have inherited family wealth.
  

Economic Identity

• Members of a very exclusive club.
• Ivy League, Seven Sisters, or psuedo-Ivy League/Seven Sisters.
• More money means more prestige. After all, USD $200,000,000 is more than only USD $100,000,000
  

View of Money and Social Class

• Emphasis on personal and family Cultural and Social Capital because money is so crass. 
• Net worth is the measure of prestige.

The Work-Income Game

• There was a game?
• Service on boards and at high executive levels is work.

Reality

• The few who hold all of the wealth, some by inheritance, some by corporate work. 
• A relatively small group of people.
• The public rich and the invisible rich.

Attributed social class

• Work? Income? These people do not rely on jobs for money. 
• For those people who use money as a score keeper, popularity measure, influence measure, these people are gods. 
• These people are studied, quoted, and deified in keynote speeches, of that is part of their managed public persona, like Jobs and Wozniak, but not Waltons or Seagrams, and the other invisible rich. 
• "If you're so rich how come you're not smart?" 
  

What does this have to do with college? 

 

As Yoda would say "Everything". Given that 65% of enrolling college students come from 35% of the population (based on the national number of first generation students attending four-year colleges) guess which social class group gets targeted by college recruiters? Guess which social rules dominate campus. 

Understanding savings and investing here is critical. Many families in the middle class do not save for their children's education, or don't save enough. The burden of student loans falls squarely on this group. The idea of college as investment is central to people in the upper-middle and upper classes.

When social class is seen primarily as money, as economic capital, then education is only seen as preparation for a well paid job. When social class is seen as economic, cultural, and social capital, then education is seen as a long term investment to gain multiple forms of wealth. Prestige colleges let you meet people who can build your social capital that can be later transformed into economic capital.

First Generation or Social Class

Will Barratt, Ph.D.
Adventurer

In diversity work in the US, especially on campus, the minority members of a community typically get more attention than the majority. That is a good thing. The majority members of the community are often dismissed as the oppressor, as the privileged.  Simply being dismissive is a bad thing.  Being dismissive dehumanizes whoever is being dismissed. That is a bad thing.

If you upend any campus and shake, what falls out? People. All kinds of people. Campus policies, procedures, campus climate, campus culture, physical reality, social reality, perceived reality, and everything else was developed by people.  All kinds of people.  Organizations are a formal fiction made by people.

First Generation students on campus, however defined, are an important part of any campus community.  People who are First Generation have issues that are unique to that group: food insecurity, economic insecurity, social insecurity, lack of membership, belonging, and mattering. (Note please that there is a literature on each one of these issues, and a growing business in helping campus leaders realize their own role is making life difficult (oppressing) first generation students.)

And . . . First Generation students exist in a larger social class context on campus, in the US, and in the world at large.  That larger social class context is inhabited by people, people who make policies, procedures, organizational maps, and all the rest that is a campus and a culture.  Where is the attention to this larger context, this majority group of people and their creations?  Should we just dismiss all of these people at oppressors?  Or should we pay attention to these people, many kinds of people, and seek to affect them in order to create a more just campus?

Surly a knowledge of social class, in all of its manifestations on campus and among people, is critical to leveling the playing field. 

Why not both?

How much emphasis should be placed on members of minority groups and how much on members of majority groups?  Good question.  How much does adding attention to members of the majority groups on campus detract from attention to members of minority groups on campus?  

Crowdsourcing this question tells me that very few people want to focus on majority members of campus. Where are the programs on telling truth to power that challenge the majority social class?  There are the slogans like "When you're accustomed to privilege, equality seems like oppression."  Unpack this a little.  Is this dismissive?  Is this blaming?  Is this telling truth to power?  Does this accurately reflect the experiences of social class majority members on campus?

Challenging campus members of the social class majority about their personal role in creating and maintaining an unjust and inequitable campus system is a difficult conversation. Is the focus on First Generation students, as I said this is critical on campus, a way to speak truth to power?  To address social class inequality on campus?  Or is direct confrontation better?

tl:dr - focus on a symptom or focus on a cause?

The margins or the middle?

 Will Barratt, Ph.D.
Adventurer, Professor, Raconteur 

This past week I happened to have a conversation with a very old friend about IQ, steering him to some more research based complexities about intelligence. In the conversation Lewis Terman came up. Terman, along with colleagues, did some pioneering research on intelligence and life. Terman and colleagues wanted to study the 'quite bright' and developed the Terman Concept Mastery Test to identify the 'quite bright' for their studies, like IQs over 145 bright. Studying smarties is one way to study intelligence. Similarly studying those on the low end of the intelligence spectrum is another way to study intelligence, but what about those in the middle?

Also this past week I had a few conversations about Autism Spectrum Disorder. Most of the study and data comes from studying those, mostly men, on one end of the spectrum. What about those on the other end of the spectrum (and women)?

Somehow this morning I realized that those working with First Generation Student programs are focusing on students in the margins of the college student population, not on the larger class issues. What about Misty and Marky (upper) Middle Class?

The spotlight focusing on the margins doesn't really illuminate the center. If you are in a dark room with a flashlight you tend to look where the light shines. Not a bad thing, but everything else is in the dark. In movies the flashlight is used to dramatic effect to highlight what is seen and to hide what is hiding in the dark. I'm interested in the whole room, not the spotlight. Mine is just a different perspective.

On the one hand, those who are different in a conspicuous way get criticized and sanctioned by the majority. On the other hand, those who are conspicuously different can help us learn a lot about difference, and by comparison, non-difference. 

Binary thinking is dangerous. Different/Same, 'quite bright'/not 'quite bright', first generation/second generation are all false binaries. Spectrum in Autism Spectrum Disorder, levels of intelligence across 'domains', social class of origin, current felt social class. These are all complex distributions with complex dimensions.

One of the dangers of shining light on the margins is that whatever is not in the spotlight is not illuminated.

One of the great things about shining a light on a group is that we can focus our attention, especially on a group that is systematically oppressed. 

Where to shine the light is a tough, and false, choice. Louis Pasteur was wrong when, on his deathbed, he said "The germ is nothing, the terrain is everything." College is a complex and constantly interacting system and collection of subsystems. This is a basic assumption of the Campus Ecology movement. Jim Banning wrote prolifically about this, back in the paper newsletter days. Today he would probably blog.

There is great work on intelligence, and on high intelligence. There is great work on neurodivergent people and on neurotypical people. There is great work on First Generation students, and great work on Second and Third generation students. This is all a yes-and issue.

Just make sure to put it all in context. 

tl;dr attend to the social class of all students on campus, and to members of class group on campus.