There are many schools of thought on who are the middle class. do you want my opinion or government numbers?
Well, you are making the accusations so yours would be relevant, However, I am surprised that there even should be government numbers dividing the people into classes so I would love to see those and where they came from also....
The household incomes have been broken down into five divisions or into quintiles by the Census Bureau of the Unites States. It revealed that the middle class income range in the year 2007 ranges between $36,000 to that of $57,660 according to the quintile measurement
Middle class income range · Income · iTaxRebate.com
With help from economist Heidi Shierholz of the Economic Policy Institute, I analyzed Census Bureau data that breaks down household income into nine brackets, going back to 1967, and is adjusted for inflation, which allows apple-to-apple comparisons from year to year. To represent the middle class, I chose three middle brackets that include household income ranging from $35,000 to $99,999. The latest data, from 2009, shows that households with income in that range account for 43.7 percent of all households. That percentage has been shrinking over time. Here's the percentage of all households that middle group, adjusted for inflation, has represented in various years:
2009: 43.7 percent
2000: 45.6 percent
1990: 47.9 percent
1980: 49.3 percent
1969: 53 percent
I listed the figure for 1969 rather than 1970 because that year represented the peak percentage for the middle-income brackets. If you defined the middle class more broadly, and lowered or raised the income threshold (or did both), the peak year would change, but only by a few years. In general, the middle brackets were fattest in the late '60s and early '70s
How the Middle Class Is Shrinking - Rick Newman (usnews.com)