I will say that high income effects stability, quality of life & consumption power by enough that it will interfere with class consciousness in a measurable way.
While a football coach or software engineer might make $250,000-1,000,000 annually and still technically be proletarian (they do not own the means of production, they are paid a wage, they share an interest, albeit smaller, in overthrowing their bosses) they will not have the same levels of potential radicalism as proles who are less comfortable and more precarious. These proles have a LONG way to go before the squeeze on the proletarian class effects them in any noticeable way, they have a much bigger buffer. They will tend to have Liberal and collaborationist ideology deep in their brain folds.
So it’s worth a nuanced discussion, but still strictly speaking the OP breakdown is jibberish. Class is a distinct and different type of categorization than income. Conflating the two as the same removed important distinctions.
high income... will interfere with class consciousness
No, they're just of a different class lol. Someone making ~$80k+ in an office job is comfortable. They've got stocks, so they can retire. They have all the necessary insurance. They have their needs taken care of because they can afford anything they need. They're labor aristocrats. "Class consciousness" for labor aristocrats is to support capitalism and imperialism. Do you seriously think someone that is that comfortable would benefit from a more equal income distribution, and the global south no longer being subjugated to produce cheap goods?
Every country has a "knowledge worker" class of labor artistocrats to manage the state and design technologies of control and infrastructure and all that stuff. And they're paid well for their services in support of the status quo. Those people are generally not going to have any connection whatsoever to people who are worse off.
Do you think the clergy and knights and stuff of feudalism were "misguided proles"?
Please read Marx, class is determined by relations to the means of production. Labor aristocrats and Lumpen are a subset of proletarians, and petty bourgeoise and national bourgeoise are a subset of bourgeoise. There are subclasses, but if someone does not own the means of production and is paid a (high) wage that’s still proletariat.
Someone who makes passive income off of investments and stocks would be partially bourgeois for that reason - not because they have an office job or a salary over a certain threshold.
Your confusion comes from some sort of moralism or something you are trying to apply to classes instead of being scientific. Not all proletariat are revolutionary, that’s why we have terms like labor aristocrats and lumpens, to distinguish those reactionary portions of the proletarian class from the more advanced and revolutionary segments.
As for your absurd leap to feudal arrangements, proletariat did not exist until the advent of capitalism and their dialectical opposite, the bourgeoise. During feudal times there was peasantry and aristocracy as dialectical opposites. The bourgeoise emerged from late feudal merchants, became a powerful class over hundreds of years and then seized power and abolished the aristocracy in most of the world through bourgeois revolutions.
I will say that high income effects stability, quality of life & consumption power by enough that it will interfere with class consciousness in a measurable way.
While a football coach or software engineer might make $250,000-1,000,000 annually and still technically be proletarian (they do not own the means of production, they are paid a wage, they share an interest, albeit smaller, in overthrowing their bosses) they will not have the same levels of potential radicalism as proles who are less comfortable and more precarious. These proles have a LONG way to go before the squeeze on the proletarian class effects them in any noticeable way, they have a much bigger buffer. They will tend to have Liberal and collaborationist ideology deep in their brain folds.
So it’s worth a nuanced discussion, but still strictly speaking the OP breakdown is jibberish. Class is a distinct and different type of categorization than income. Conflating the two as the same removed important distinctions.
Anyone wanna point me to the software engineering jobs that pay $250,000 👀
https://i.imgur.com/0DpXOXo.jpg
Just get 15+ Years of experience, move to California and work in Finance industry on the upper end of the bound. Duh
You forgot the part about being wealthy enough to network with people who can get you a job in finance
It’s called getting a Masters in Comp Sci and a CPA in 1999 sweaty
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levels.fyi
No, they're just of a different class lol. Someone making ~$80k+ in an office job is comfortable. They've got stocks, so they can retire. They have all the necessary insurance. They have their needs taken care of because they can afford anything they need. They're labor aristocrats. "Class consciousness" for labor aristocrats is to support capitalism and imperialism. Do you seriously think someone that is that comfortable would benefit from a more equal income distribution, and the global south no longer being subjugated to produce cheap goods?
Every country has a "knowledge worker" class of labor artistocrats to manage the state and design technologies of control and infrastructure and all that stuff. And they're paid well for their services in support of the status quo. Those people are generally not going to have any connection whatsoever to people who are worse off.
Do you think the clergy and knights and stuff of feudalism were "misguided proles"?
Please read Marx, class is determined by relations to the means of production. Labor aristocrats and Lumpen are a subset of proletarians, and petty bourgeoise and national bourgeoise are a subset of bourgeoise. There are subclasses, but if someone does not own the means of production and is paid a (high) wage that’s still proletariat.
Someone who makes passive income off of investments and stocks would be partially bourgeois for that reason - not because they have an office job or a salary over a certain threshold.
Your confusion comes from some sort of moralism or something you are trying to apply to classes instead of being scientific. Not all proletariat are revolutionary, that’s why we have terms like labor aristocrats and lumpens, to distinguish those reactionary portions of the proletarian class from the more advanced and revolutionary segments.
As for your absurd leap to feudal arrangements, proletariat did not exist until the advent of capitalism and their dialectical opposite, the bourgeoise. During feudal times there was peasantry and aristocracy as dialectical opposites. The bourgeoise emerged from late feudal merchants, became a powerful class over hundreds of years and then seized power and abolished the aristocracy in most of the world through bourgeois revolutions.