Welby fails working class Britain

Readers across the US will be familiar with the problems currently facing us here in the UK. No doubt you will be in receipt of news from the usual suspects, sorry, news channels, purveying the approved version of events here in the Old Country. Let’s have a look, shall we?

For the last nearly thirty years — since 1997, when one T. Blair came to power — the working class of the UK have been virtually abandoned. For those in the US who don’t understand our British ‘class thing’, the working class can be quantified as follows:

Nearly half of all Brits (49%) consider themselves working class and just over a third (36%) think of themselves as middle class and just one per cent upper class. 78% of those who grew up in a working class family classify themselves as this now.

(UK Government Social Mobility Barometer).

Back in the day, it was a typical working-class aspiration to ‘ascend’ to the middle class — office work, and other well-paid positions requiring higher educational skills — careers, rather than jobs. For years now, this aspiration has no longer been necessary or beyond reach in the UK, as personal wealth and opportunities for ‘social mobility’ have increased. Many people who could be identified as middle-class on the socioeconomic spectrum are happy and proud to still call themselves working class. And why not?

The working class itself has been defined, by other writers, as the social group consisting primarily of people who are employed in unskilled or semi-skilled, manual or industrial work, and people who are supported by jobs that provide low pay, require limited skill, or physical labour.

The working class is the backbone of the economy and the social fabric. They may not all be the most educated or well-paid in the world, but our society cannot do without them and their contribution. Until 1997, that is.

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