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Every society has its own way of talking about socioeconomic class.

In America/Canada, people talk about the "poor", "(lower/upper) middle class",
and "upper class", as well as the "1%" and ".1%"; basing everything off of
economic levels alone.

In places like the the UK however, and pardon the fact I'm not a brit, they
talk more about the "working class", which including everyone who mainly does
low skilled jobs and lives off a wage alone, and contrast it with a "middle
class" of people who are more specialized and less bound to an employer. A
distinction that of course often results in people such as myself getting
confused when reading the guardian, seeing sentences like "and it was vary
unexpected that Corbyn picked up so many middle class voters". :)

Given this distinction I'm found myself quite curious: How do Japanese people
talk, and in doing so, think about, socioeconomic class? What terminology do
they use? What aspect do they focus on (USA = income, UK = role)?

PS. Sorry if I deeply misunderstand what "working" and "middle" class refers
to, british people whom may be reading this.
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culture
How do Japanese people think/talk about socioeconomic classes?
Social (hierarchical) class, in general terms, is called 階層. The occupation-
based classification (the "role class" you called) is in particular called 階級.

Thus,

  * 上流階級 _upper class_
  * 中産階級／中流階級 _middle class_
  * 労働者階級 _working class_

And the income-based classes are referred to as -層 (階層 itself is not used as
part of words).

  * 富裕層 _the rich (wealthy class)_
  * 中間層 _middle(-income) class_
  * 貧困層 _the poor (underclass)_

中間層 and 中流階級 are often interchangeable like English "middle class", but
swapping the combination of words is uncommon.
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Role focused class structure is not a common concept used to describe modern
Japan. Neither really income-based, at least from maybe the 50s up to the 90s
(see
[一億総中流](https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E4%B8%80%E5%84%84%E7%B7%8F%E4%B8%AD%E6%B5%81)).
However, recently the word 格差社会 picked up, and there is a lot more talk about
貧困層 (the poor), 富裕層 (the rich) and 格差の固定化 (decreasing social mobility). I
guess income-based classes are starting to become a more common concept.

That said "elites" is a very socially embedded concept. 学歴社会 (essentially
class structure by academic (exam) achievement) has been a core part of Japan
for long. These classes then translate to 「一流サラリーマン」(people who get jobs at
prestigious (and normally large) companies) and 「三流サラリーマン」(people who get job
at less prestigious (normally SMEs)). The lowest on this ladder is 「フリーター」who
survives on temporary jobs. There is one class lower than this though, which
would be 「ニート」(NEET). Words like 一流サラリーマン, 三流サラリーマン are more like slangs and
are not part of a formal vocabulary.
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