Why do people from privileged class backgrounds often misidentify their origins as working class?

[Smokeandsteam]

That's true but that isn't what Smokeandsteam is saying

Yup. I’d also add that we seem to have reached a new moment now, where the middle class vanguard has decided that those they profess to speak and act for are now also middle class.

Strange days.

 

[platinumsage]

Perhaps we need a Workers' Committee for the Determination of Class to ascertain the True Class of each and every person prior to the commencement of the revolution.

 

[seeformiles]

When we bought our house, it was a purely financial decision rather than a class aspiration. The mortgage payments were half that of renting a similar property so it was an easy choice. Of course this was in much saner times when anyone on a small income could secure a mortgage (& house prices to match) and 30 years on it’s all paid off. It’s first and foremost a home and it’s surreal to see what it’s currently valued at. I’d welcome a price correction if it meant we could return to a saner property market where people don’t have to work themselves to death to purchase a basic human need and right. Recent purchases in our street have largely been made by affluent London families who made huge profits selling up and find after moving North that they could easily outbid locals and push prices even further out of their reach. Despite our very modest wages and frugal ways, I’ve never felt so middle class! The joys of accidentally being born at the “right” time.

 

[The39thStep]

Because homeowners have multiple parties chasing their votes and renters have none?

Because that one particular form of material interest is the single biggest material factor affecting a person's quality of life? Because neoliberal capitalism is now entirely focussed on property speculation and there can be no challenge to it that doesn't address homes and housing?

In what way do multiple parties particularly chase homeowners' votes ?

 

[ska invita]

how many of them are working people who are approaching (or past) retirement age and have paid their mortgage off?

because house prices 30+ years ago were such that working people who had a steady job could get a mortgage?

do they suddenly change class now?

when there was a big class questionnaire test thing a few years back owning your own home/mortgage plus other stuff made you "traditional working class" exactly for the reasons you say

The Great British class calculator

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[A380]

Perhaps we need a Workers' Committee for the Determination of Class to ascertain the True Class of each and every person prior to the commencement of the revolution.

And anyone deemed ‘not working class enough’ can be made to wear a placard round their necks.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

In what way do multiple parties particularly chase homeowners' votes ?

By doing all they can to prop up the housing market, to the extent of borrowing billions in order to do so. Labour and Tories will both do this.

 

[platinumsage]

And anyone deemed ‘not working class enough’ can be made to wear a placard round their necks.

I think forcing them to shop at Iceland should be sufficient.

 

[Brainaddict]

By doing all they can to prop up the housing market, to the extent of borrowing billions in order to do so. Labour and Tories will both do this.

Yes, including some very obvious things like 'help to buy', which should be called 'help to push up house prices'. Also they refuse to follow rational policies that would clearly be for the greater good, like limiting foreign ownership by people who don't live in the country, meaning we have money coming in from all over the world to prop up house prices.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

The idea that public money could be put into the private housing market ought to be just totally out of the question. How could that ever be acceptable use of public money? Yet both Labour and Tories do it.

 

[Pickman's model]

The idea that public money could be put into the private housing market ought to be just totally out of the question. How could that ever be acceptable use of public money? Yet both Labour and Tories do it.

Yet the private rented sector receives billions of pounds of public money every year in the form of benefits. What would you propose replaces that component of UC, seeing as you're dead set against public money going into private housing?

 

[The39thStep]

By doing all they can to prop up the housing market, to the extent of borrowing billions in order to do so. Labour and Tories will both do this.

I appreciate that they do this but in what way is that actually ‘chasing the homeowners vote’ ?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I appreciate that they do this but in what way is that actually ‘chasing the homeowners vote’ ?

In what way is it not?

To give one example out of many: Gordon Brown and his attitude towards the rapid rise in house prices that was going on at the time of the 2005 election. Rather than apologising for it and promising measures to stop prices from rising further, he boasted about it, encouraging schemes like 'part-rent part-buy', which were a public subsidy targeted at propping the whole edifice up by providing a continuing supply of first-time buyers.

 

[Brainaddict]

I do think a lot of the deal with homeowners is implicit. Governments of both parties know that if house prices go down they will lose the next election, and the Tories know that if prices go up, that will help the economy run without wage or benefits increases, thus making them look like succesful managers of the economy. But it isn't often that a party will make an explicit pitch to homeowners to say they'll keep prices going up because that would piss off some other potential voters too much.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I do think a lot of the deal with homeowners is implicit. Governments of both parties know that if house prices go down they will lose the next election, and the Tories know that if prices go up, that will help the economy run without wage or benefits increases, thus making them look like succesful managers of the economy. But it isn't often that a party will make an explicit pitch to homeowners to say they'll keep prices going up because that would piss off some other potential voters too much.

I think you're largely right. However, Gordon Brown did make that explicit pitch in the 2000s. And the Tories didn't counter it by saying 'house price boom is bad news'. And also much of this stuff is expressed in a somewhat coded form, such as 'this is how we will help people onto the housing ladder' when announcing a policy that also has the effect of propping/driving up prices.

 

[The39thStep]

In what way is it not?

To give one example out of many: Gordon Brown and his attitude towards the rapid rise in house prices that was going on at the time of the 2005 election. Rather than apologising for it and promising measures to stop prices from rising further, he boasted about it, encouraging schemes like 'part-rent part-buy', which were a public subsidy targeted at propping the whole edifice up by providing a continuing supply of first-time buyers.

Maybe its just semantics about what chasing votes looks like but even that example doesn't look like chasing votes to me, more a reflection of an established orthodoxy that is regrettably built around homeownership.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

I do think a lot of the deal with homeowners is implicit. Governments of both parties know that if house prices go down they will lose the next election, and the Tories know that if prices go up, that will help the economy run without wage or benefits increases, thus making them look like succesful managers of the economy. But it isn't often that a party will make an explicit pitch to homeowners to say they'll keep prices going up because that would piss off some other potential voters too much.

I still don’t see how rising house prices benefits working class home owners. Unless they’re planning on selling up and having their retirement in Goa.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Maybe its just semantics about what chasing votes looks like but even that example doesn't look like chasing votes to me, more a reflection of an established orthodoxy that is regrettably built around homeownership.

Ok. I'm not going to argue over that particularly. But it's been clear since at least the 1990s that whichever of the main parties gets in, voters can be confident that they will be acting in ways that will keep house prices up - and drive up private rents. (And suppress wages.) It's one of Thatcher's enduring victories.

ETA: And I think Frank is right to say that nobody is chasing/cares too much about alienating the votes of people in private renting, aside from offering new ways to get them their first mortgage.

 

[andysays]

Maybe its just semantics about what chasing votes looks like but even that example doesn't look like chasing votes to me, more a reflection of an established orthodoxy that is regrettably built around homeownership.

Yeah, I think there's a distinction to be made between supporting the housing market and supporting individual home owners.

There's obviously some overlap, but some measures which claim to be about the latter are actually far more about the former.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Yeah, I think there's a distinction to be made between supporting the housing market and supporting individual home owners.

There's obviously some overlap, but some measures which claim to be about the latter are actually far more about the former.

This isn't a very Urban thing to say, but I don't think there's any major disagreement here.

 

[Brainaddict]

I still don’t see how rising house prices benefits working class home owners. Unless they’re planning on selling up and having their retirement in Goa.

People moving from higher value areas to lower value areas (shitloads of Londoners have made shitloads of money moving out*). People downsizing their properties when their kids leave home (you might easily get £200k cash out of it in many areas, moving say from a 500k family house into a 300k retirement house). People remortgaging their properties to subsidise expansion of the property, or doing equity release to fund consumption. Also people do of course sell up and go to live abroad, not just at retirement.

*To give an example I know something about, the property my co-op bought in London a couple of years back cost £500k. It was bought from a working class family who had bought it in the mid 2000s for £120,000. They were moving out to a cheaper location on the edge of London where they could now buy without a mortgage and have cash left over.


PS I'm trying not to exaggerate the scale of winnings here. In fact a fairly normal family home with 4 bedrooms round me now costs more like £700k but £500k is 'normal' in a lot of the south east and other expensive urban and rural pockets around the country.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Friends of mine sold up their house in Brixton, bought in the 70s for about £3k, for three quarters of a million. Moved into a much bigger house in Bedford with a pile of cash left over. This was a few years ago. They'd probably have got a million plus for it now.

I totally don't blame them. They were retired and cash-poor (his pension was stolen by Maxwell). But they wouldn't have moved had it not been for the cash incentive, and it was sad to see them go.

It's a common phenomenon in London.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

Friends of mine sold up their house in Brixton, bought in the 70s for about £3k, for three quarters of a million. Moved into a much bigger house in Bedford with a pile of cash left over. This was a few years ago. They'd probably have got a million plus for it now.

I totally don't blame them. They were retired and cash-poor (his pension was stolen by Maxwell). But they wouldn't have moved had it not been for the cash incentive, and it was sad to see them go.

It's a common phenomenon in London.

I’ve never been able to get on the property ladder in London. I could in my home town, if there was actually a job there that would facilitate it.

 

[Sue]

Friends of mine sold up their house in Brixton, bought in the 70s for about £3k, for three quarters of a million. Moved into a much bigger house in Bedford with a pile of cash left over. This was a few years ago. They'd probably have got a million plus for it now.

I totally don't blame them. They were retired and cash-poor (his pension was stolen by Maxwell). But they wouldn't have moved had it not been for the cash incentive, and it was sad to see them go.

It's a common phenomenon in London.

A friend bought his place in London 30+ years ago. (He's a gardener and his ex did similar work which shows just how much things have changed...) He used to know everyone on his street but they've been slowly moving out over the last few years and are being replaced by a completely different demographic.

He's desperate to stay but has very little pension provision and is approaching 60 so I suspect he'll end up selling up and moving.

In the scheme of things, having a house that's worth a lot is a nice problem to have but think he's a bit depressed that his settled community -- most people had been there as long as him if not even longer -- has pretty much disappeared.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

People moving from higher value areas to lower value areas (shitloads of Londoners have made shitloads of money moving out*). People downsizing their properties when their kids leave home (you might easily get £200k cash out of it in many areas, moving say from a 500k family house into a 300k retirement house). People remortgaging their properties to subsidise expansion of the property, or doing equity release to fund consumption. Also people do of course sell up and go to live abroad, not just at retirement.

*To give an example I know something about, the property my co-op bought in London a couple of years back cost £500k. It was bought from a working class family who had bought it in the mid 2000s for £120,000. They were moving out to a cheaper location on the edge of London where they could now buy without a mortgage and have cash left over.


PS I'm trying not to exaggerate the scale of winnings here. In fact a fairly normal family home with 4 bedrooms round me now costs more like £700k but £500k is 'normal' in a lot of the south east and other expensive urban and rural pockets around the country.

I think London is kind of exceptional. A £500k house in London would cost perhaps £150k further up the country.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I think London is kind of exceptional. A £500k house in London would cost perhaps £150k further up the country.

London and a few other places such as Brighton and Cambridge. It is exceptional but also it's a fair old chunk of people.

 

[Magnus McGinty]

London and a few other places such as Brighton and Cambridge. It is exceptional but also it's a fair old chunk of people.

In terms of the working class it will be those who managed to buy before it went insane or those who benefitted from the right to buy scheme. There’ll be a vanishingly small number able to buy now with lots seemingly getting bulldozed out of what’s left of social housing.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

In terms of the working class it will be those who managed to buy before it went insane or those who benefitted from the right to buy scheme. There’ll be a vanishingly small number able to buy now with lots seemingly getting bulldozed out of what’s left of social housing.

Yep.

 

[A380]

I think forcing them to shop at Iceland should be sufficient.

But Iceland sells Vienettas nowadays so, according to some, must be middle class.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

and very hmm at the idea somewhere in the thread that any retired person with a work pension (probably achieved at least in part as a result of worker / union action) is somehow middle class and exploiting the working class by having that pension.

until not that long ago, jobs like postman, bus worker, railway worker, local authority / civil service manual worker, NHS staff in jobs like porters and cleaners (many of these jobs have since been privatised and / or had their pension scheme closed or reduced) came with a decent pension scheme. as (i think) did coal miners and workers in other nationalised industries that have either been sold off or shut down altogether.

most railway workers have kept theirs and have put up the occasional fight to do so (TFL / Underground workers' pensions are currently under attack)

seeing these workers / retired workers as the problem strikes me as going right along with the tories' divide and rule / race to the bottom / level down agenda.

and another angle on working class home ownership - for the 'windrush generation' and some time beyond, it was pretty close to impossible for anyone without an 'established local connection' even to get on the list for council housing, and even if they did, there are a number of accounts of councils having unwritten racist allocations procedures...