&gt; Good point. Actually I think the strict definition of &quot;middle class&quot; should be simply the average in a certain country.<p>That assumes a normal distribution of wealth. In an authoritarian aristocracy or another similar government structure, you&#x27;d see pareto distribution wherein the leadership has 99% of the wealth and the average person is sharing 1%.<p>Therein by the &#x27;average&#x27;, there is no middle class.<p>I think... economically, this is quite true: there is no middle class. Yet we still call people who look like the classical middle class of yesteryear, middle class: professionals, white-collar workers, freelancers, small business owners. It&#x27;s more of a social class now, than an economic one.