Middle Class

P

Patrick

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Does greater Boston have a noticeable middle class? I seem to notice pockets of poverty next to pockets of wealth, but no in between. In contrast, places in northern new england seem to be composed of primarily middle class folks. What's the deal. Where are the middle class sections of greater Boston, if there are any.
 
Revere, Medford, Malden, Everett, Winthrop, Somerville, East Boston, South Boston, Hyde Park, West Roxbury, much of Dorchester, Brighton, Quincy, Hull, Watertown, Waltham, Framingham, Natick etc. etc. etc...
 
I was in Waltham the other day and nothing about it struck me as middle class. Granted it wasn't necessarily an impoverished ghetto either.
 
Patrick said:
I was in Waltham the other day and nothing about it struck me as middle class. Granted it wasn't necessarily an impoverished ghetto either.
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Ey' thar be the problem.

Define your concept of "Middle Class". :?:
 
Patrick said:
I was in Waltham the other day and nothing about it struck me as middle class. Granted it wasn't necessarily an impoverished ghetto either.
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I grew up in Waltham.
It has some lower class areas near downtown, but the majority of the city is what I would call Middle Class. What part of Waltham were you in?
 
What is 'not middle class' about Moody Street? It is certainly not a rich neighborhood, nor is it a poor one.
 
Statler, lets not argue about semantics. Clearly this is a subjective classification, and it varies from place to place, and undoubtedly is relative, but what I mean is a widespread area consisting of homeowners who are in line closely with the mean income for the area. what's the mean income for greater Boston? Is there any area that really consists of people who earn close to it? It seems more like the millionaires average with the slums to come up with a meaningless unperceptible and misleading average.

Windycity, I was in what appeared to be a downtown. Looked like a bunch of interconnected traditional main streets. Dense housing, no setbacks from sidewalks, low rise buildings, a river, and a multi-story mid rise apartment building.
 
Ron Newman said:
What is 'not middle class' about Moody Street? It is certainly not a rich neighborhood, nor is it a poor one.
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Who brought up moody street and why do you refer to it in particular?
 
I think you have a misperception of the area, and I don't think the term "middle class" is subjective at all.

How about we go with towns whose median income is somewhere between 80% and 120% of Greater Boston median income. I bet we could find that data pretty easily. I'd do it but I don't have time right now. Maybe later this evening.

I'd be willing to bet that Waltham and every other town I listed in there falls somewhere in that range, and I would bet that there are many others that do as well.
 
PerfectHandle said:
I think you have a misperception of the area, and I don't think the term "middle class" is subjective at all.

How about we go with towns whose median income is somewhere between 80% and 120% of Greater Boston median income. I bet we could find that data pretty easily. I'd do it but I don't have time right now. Maybe later this evening.

I'd be willing to bet that Waltham and every other town I listed in there falls somewhere in that range, and I would bet that there are many others that do as well.
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Sure, that's what I'm looking for. And it is certainly subjective, as in there is no widely accepted definition.
 
Patrick said:
Who brought up moody street and why do you refer to it in particular?
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Because it's the main commercial street of Waltham, and therefore represents the city well. It contains most of Waltham's retail stores and restaurants, as well as its only movie theatre.
 
Ron Newman said:
Patrick said:
Who brought up moody street and why do you refer to it in particular?
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Because it's the main commercial street of Waltham, and therefore represents the city well. It contains most of Waltham's retail stores and restaurants, as well as its only movie theatre.
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Hmm, I see. The reason I ask is because that is the particular street I spent time on. I was unaware it was the main thoroughfare, as several of the other surrounding streets appeared similar in design. i was going to say it would have been an odd coincidence that you just picked that one out of the blue. But now I understand...

I don't mean to offend the proud greater Boston audience here, but you have to be wearing a blindfold not to notice the stark contrast in wealth and neighborhoods as your drive from the suburbs toward the city. That's what i mean about a lacking middle class.
 
There's a 'stark contrast' between Waltham and super-rich Weston, but Waltham pretty much runs into Newton and Watertown without a noticeable boundary. Moody Street doesn't feel to me that different from Davis Square, and I'd call Davis Square middle-class.
 
Patrick said:
I don't mean to offend the proud greater Boston audience here, but you have to be wearing a blindfold not to notice the stark contrast in wealth and neighborhoods as your drive from the suburbs toward the city. That's what i mean about a lacking middle class.
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I don't find what you're saying offensive. I just find it ill-informed. Give us a specific example or two and we can discuss.

Your first one, Waltham, is pretty clearly middle class. I still can't figure out if you think Waltham is upscale or poor or what. Which is it?
 
PerfectHandle said:
Patrick said:
I don't mean to offend the proud greater Boston audience here, but you have to be wearing a blindfold not to notice the stark contrast in wealth and neighborhoods as your drive from the suburbs toward the city. That's what i mean about a lacking middle class.
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I don't find what you're saying offensive. I just find it ill-informed. Give us a specific example or two and we can discuss.

Your first one, Waltham, is pretty clearly middle class. I still can't figure out if you think Waltham is upscale or poor or what. Which is it?
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Yah I think Waltham does a good job of mixing it up. It's not upper class like Weston and Lincoln, yet its not majorly lower class either. It does have some housing projects and some slum-like housing here and there, but it also has some nice new apartment complexes and a large section of middle to upper middle class housing. Pretty middle class to me. Although if you spent most of your time in certain sections of the downtow area (there are several group homes for recovering addicts and crazies, and there is a Labor Ready employement center that usually has a crowd of unemployed people outside), I can see how one might get the impression that Waltham is rundown.
 
Whereas I think of downtown Waltham as mostly consisting of ethnic restaurants, a brewpub, condos (Grover Cronin), old mill buildings reused as artists' lofts, an arty movie theatre, and some unusual retail stores such as Construction Site toys,
 
bosdevelopment said:
ablarc said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_middle_class
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That class article was the biggest load i've ever read.

Who writes this stuff?
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Ahh, Wikipedia:
What you've proposed is a kind of quantum encyclopedia, where genuine data both exists and doesn't exist depending on the precise moment I rely upon your discordant fucking mob for my information.
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