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Many Coloradans Unsure If They Are In Middle Class

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May 25, 2009 10:39 pm US/Mountain

Many Coloradans Unsure If They Are In Middle Class

Good Question: What Does Middle Class Mean?

Written by Alan Gionet

Reporting
Alan Gionet
DENVER (CBS4) ― "I'd say we were middle class, I'd say we were," said Jacqueline Sinclair.

Jacqueline and her husband Kurt had their children at the Memorial Day parade in Commerce City.

"My reality is much different than somebody sitting across the street," said Kurt.

He's right about that. Vice President Joe Biden will bring his Middle Class Task Force to the Denver Museum of Nature and Science on Tuesday for a meeting on green jobs and the middle class. The task force is based on the idea that a strong middle class equals a strong America.

"I'd like to provide for the family and do the things that we want to do, that we think are important," said Kurt, who works as an architect. His wife stays home to care for their four children.

Political leaders pay a lot of attention to the middle class because a lot of people consider themselves in the middle. Core American values are believed to reside in the middle class.

"That may be a cliché and that may be one of those romantic notions but there's something to it," said University of Denver associate professor of economics Dr. Tracy Mott. "People that are poor want to be middle class and people in the upper class probably don't want to be identified that way."

A CBS News poll done in 2007 found only 2 percent of their sample group of nearly 1,000 people considered themselves upper class and only 7 percent considered themselves lower class.

The U.S. Census Bureau doesn't define middle class. It does reveal median income. The latest figures are from 2007. The median income then was $50,233.

CBS4 asked Mott if the range for middle class might run from the upper $20,000 range to $100,000.

"Probably people who are making between $100,000 and $200,000 are considering themselves middle class and these days that may not be too much of a stretch. Now for people below that they may say, 'What are they talking about?'"

So it's how you define it. Or how our politicians define it when they are answering our worries in troubled times.

(© MMIX CBS Television Stations, Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)

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