• Tja@programming.dev
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    1
    arrow-down
    6
    ·
    11 months ago

    The middle class existed long before the new deal or unions. Like a century before.

    • alekwithak@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      7
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      11 months ago

      Actually the term was coined at the 1939 Worlds Fair and popularized in '44 with Roosevelt’s signing of the GI Bill, but if you have even the smallest shred of evidence for your claims, go ahead, I’m humoring.

      • Tja@programming.dev
        link
        fedilink
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        5
        ·
        11 months ago

        The term “middle class” is first attested in James Bradshaw’s 1745 pamphlet Scheme to prevent running Irish Wools to France.[6][7]

        Go check the Wikipedia sources

        • alekwithak@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          6
          arrow-down
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          11 months ago

          That’s not a source, that’s a number. You have to link the sources, you can’t just paste Wikipedia. In any case this is a discussion about specifically the American middle class.

          Edit’: Also I found the Wikipedia article you’re citing and it directly contradicts your point: “The modern usage of the term “middle-class”, however, dates to the 1913 UK Registrar-General’s report, in which the statistician T.H.C. Stevenson identified the middle class as those falling between the upper-class and the working-class.[14] The middle class includes: professionals, managers, and senior civil servants. The chief defining characteristic of membership in the middle-class is control of significant human capital while still being under the dominion of the elite upper class, who control much of the financial and legal capital in the world.”

          • Tja@programming.dev
            link
            fedilink
            arrow-up
            3
            arrow-down
            4
            ·
            11 months ago

            See, you went to Wikipedia like a big boy and checked the sources yourself! Good job!

            You also found, that it was not related to the new deal, nor to unions and it was defined in terms of capitalism. It must have been exhausting!