Overview
- A Pew Research Center analysis of a January 2026 survey of 8,512 U.S. adults found 60% now say the term “working class” describes them, up from 54% in 2024.
- The label no longer maps cleanly to income, education, or occupation because people use it to mean different things such as pay level, degree status, job type, or simply ‘working to pay bills.’
- Partisan differences persist: 67% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents identify as working class compared with 55% of Democrats and Democratic leaners, a gap that holds after controlling for income and education.
- Economic sentiment helps explain the rise because many Americans report financial strain even as median wages have grown, and the shrinking middle class has left more people feeling economically squeezed.
- The broader, more ambiguous use of the term is changing politics by letting candidates target affordability voters across income and education lines, as seen in local campaigns that frame anyone who must work to pay bills as part of the working class.