@dave @MandyJane The way I think about it, the difference between middle middle class and upper middle class is middle middle class can, with careful budgeting and more often around retirement, sometimes afford some of the luxuries within reach of "common folks": a nice house (not a mansion) in a safe suburban neighborhood, a luxury/sports car or truck, a non-luxury sailboat, an RV, comfortable vacations abroad (not just cheaper all-included resorts), a vacation home/cabin, sending the kids to good private schools, etc... You can often identify middle middle class because they will be really extremely protective and proud of the luxuries they have managed to procure.

To the upper middle class, these are more frequent and don't require particular budgeting to achieve. They're not "impulse" purchases (that's for the upper class), and they might not have ALL the listed luxuries, but they probably won't even consider a <40 000$ car.