I never knew how much money my father makes, and I honestly still don't know. He's very secretive about money. I know how much the city says his house is worth, but I also know that the neighborhood has skyrocketed since they bought the place when I was three. I know it got a lot harder for him when my parents divorced, and he was suddenly paying for everything himself. He did a really good job of keeping it secret, though--the only time he ever let anything slip was one time I added shampoo to the grocery list and he said, "Do you really need this?" and I just stared at him blankly and he quickly moved on.

As an adult I learned that he had taken some pretty significant loans from friends, and was just at that point in the stages of paying them off. But he made sure we did okay in the end--my overall impression was we were just getting by, through insanely responsible money handling. I remember multiple lectures on financial responsibility. We took vacations, but always with frequent flier miles and free hotel stays from his extensive work traveling. I had a job starting at 15, so at that point I was paying for almost all my own clothing and entertainment desires. I went to college on a full scholarship, holding anywhere from one to three jobs at a time. During college he would occasionally ask if I needed any money, but I had such a huge sense of pride that I always turned him down. I also never cashed my grandmother's $5 birthday checks every year, starting around the age of 10. I was aware that she was "poor," living in a nasty house way out in the country, and felt uncomfortable taking her money.

Exactly. That's why I was asking Els his perception after using that term. :)

I agree

My mother and father were still in college when they got married and had me, so money was very tight (like food stamps tight) back then. Things got somewhat better after they finished school--my parents were able to purchase an old Victorian-style house and renovate it slowly. I'd say my family was not quite middle-class financially, but being involved in the art world, we got to enjoy the upper-crustier cultural and social side, too. We had an old used car and grass wouldn't grow on our lawn, but the fancy benefit art shows and parties at the mayor's house balanced it out. ;)

They started out poor- my dad married a woman with 4 kids. But he worked his way up the ranks in the military until we became middle class. We traveled more than most in the middle-class. I think my head is still spinning from all that movement...Daddy was a Col. in the Air Force. It really doesn't matter how rich you are when you spend your life on military bases. It's really quite drab no matter what. Now he's a Director of the Southern Branches for a prominent health insurance firm. I think they all retire into the same company. I'm pretty sure I met some of those guys while they were still in the military. Well- I know I did.......But I still ate just as much Ramen and mayonnaise sandwiches as everyone else....I think.

*Yes it is ironic that my father is a supposed healthcare provider. Well seems a little ironic right now......I'll get over it.*

Three phases: When I was a very wee tike (almost too young to remember), mom and dad made furniture out of cardboard boxes, and we had a 13" black and white wheelie TV. Mom stayed at home and dad was NCO range enlisted, so not too much cash.

When I was elementary school-age we'd just started to get comfortable middle-middle class. Then dad retired from the AF and started going to school, so we started watching money more. Not as bad as cardboard boxes, but we did stay with my grandparents for a few months, rented their house for super cheap, and then moved into a double wide trailer. It was a nice double wide, but it was a trailer nonetheless.

Finally my dad got his PhD, my mom's 100 person telecommunications company exploded to reach out to most of the midwest and got a promotion (and stocks to include). So like 3 months before I left for college, they built their own house. Now they have a new car, large TV, they jet around the country, take cruises and go skiing/canoing/camping every friggin weekend.

And you wish they'd give it all up and live on the farm, right? ;)

No, I just wish it happened sooner so I could have had a big screen in HS. ;)

some of it may have to do with how old and established in their own lives parents are when they have kids. I was the baby, many years after my sisters, and my parents were in their 40s when I was born. So, more money. Whereas I had my own kids young, and we were poor as dirt.

I felt like we were, but we were not. What we did have was community standing, so I think people treated us like we were wealthy. My dad was teacher all his life, by the time I was born he had been the High School principal for a number of years and that is how I knew him. We lived on the main street of a suburb city of Chicago. So everyone knew where we lived. Modest truely a middle class home of the time. We were solidly middle class. One car family til my dad became the Superintendent for the school system. Things went on like that til I was ten. Who knows what happened but things unravelled a bit around then and he took another job as a principal on the East coast, Long Is. NY, and another, his last, in NJ. He left education about then and never looked back. We remained middle class in income with quite a few bumps to some economic lows. I have had the most economic success of all of my family members. I attribute it to nothing more than making some early firm career choices and sticking to them, followed by a few more career choices that required personal sacrifice and the commitment to go back to college for an advanced degree. Another correct choice. I was lucky.

Military housing until the end of the war (WW II).
Followed by a free standing one car garage with an outhouse, cold water pitcher pump and wood stove, for a year.
Then they built a cinder block kitchen and toilet & shower closet, into a side hill, and moved the garage on top. Outside stairs and stone steps, to go up and down.
When I was 8, Pop and my uncles built a cellar and capped it to live in for two years, until the house got built.

Lived the first three years of my life in the upper level of my grandparents' house. Then moved to a 'double', or semi-detached in a seedy but not dangerous neighborhood. Drank powdered (lumpy!) milk and ate not much. My father shot rabbits to help with the groceries. Later my father's income went up and we moved to a detached house; unfortunately at that point my mother's compulsive spending threw our finances into disarray with more downs than ups.

My parents didn't contribute any money to my college education; I was the first in my extended family to go to college and they didn't see it as a 'given' or a 'must' (only I saw it that way). Lived in the same pair of jeans for twelve years and ate, again, not much.

Now that we have a very good family income I still never feel secure. I budget and scrimp and save and worry, no matter what.

Grew up very poor. There were times my parents didn't eat so my brother and I could.

How wealthy was your family?...Huh?
 

This will probably sound like a Victor Hugo or James Joyce story...But as Bill Murray said..."That's the facts, Jack!"

My parents divorced and I was put in an orphanage at the age of 5 or so...Was there a while and met the reign of the original Sister Mary Discipline ...Goddamn ruler hurts on the knuckles.....more on the ass.....Read every book in the school library....then went to two foster homes working on farms in the Appalachian Mountains...More of a hired hand than any part of a family...Milked cows...slaughtered pigs....killed lots of snakes.... chased chickens, ducks and geese.... Rode horses (still bow legged)(But, I could ride any horse)....Was somewhat incorrigible....got in trouble with the law....Minor stuff...But as a result was shipped out to Father Flanagan's Boys Home at Boys Town, Nebraska at the tender age of 12.

Graduated High School at the age of 17... Was still considered a minor and therefore a ward of the court....had enough of discipline and structure and took off on my own with no money and no plan. Dodging the authorities....Till I turned 18...

Went to Ohio State for a while....(met my wife there)...Then had to decide, school....Or I could eat regular.....but not both.....Dropped out of school.....immediately drafted..spent a year in Viet-Nam...grew up a lot...aged even more....

Came home with an attitude and a lot of pent up anger....Got into some fights....Got many jobs....Did income taxes....sold window film and solar heaters....Real estate....water softeners...air freight...Dining Guides....lots of crap...

Then two things happened...my son was born and I got a job with the best Fire Department in the US.....(Phoenix of course)

That was over 30 years ago and I am still here...same house for 37 years...same wife for 39 years.....

So, I guess it's true..Life is what you make it.

When I hear Tony Bennett sing "Rags To Riches", I figure it must be for me.....

My family were poor by today's standards, and still reasonably poor by the standards of the day. I remember getting our telephone, and our first fridge freezer - prior to that it was the callbox on the corner and a larder fridge with a tiny icebox.

We didn't have a car when I lived at home, and hired one to go on holiday - although we went every year it was always camping and never at a time when the weather was really suitable as the prices were too high on those weeks.

My parents cooked "real" food - making their own chips, breading their own fish, lots of casseroles with cheaper cuts of meat and mince (ground) beef that had to have the fat skimmed off it a couple of times before use. We always had enough to eat, but towards the end of the month the choices would diminish - cheese or ham for sandwiches, no crisps (chips) with packed lunch, a biscuit (cookie) wrapped in foil rather than a chocolate biscuit bar.

Both my parents worked, and worked shifts, so there was always someone home, when we woke up, when we came home for lunch, when we got home from school. It was a great way to grow up.

We went to the cinema about once a year - it was a big treat. We saved all our pocket money after Christmas for our holiday, so we could buy seaside tat, postcards and ice cream. We only ever went out to dinner when family visited (and paid for it) and we always packed our own food when we went anywhere, rather than eating at the concessions. I envied the children eating burgers and drinking out of waxed paper cups with straws - we'd be sharing a limp sandwich and a warm lemonade.

I remember my first visit to McDonalds and I wondered about the fact our burgers were in paper, as were our fries, when other people had burgers in polysterene boxes and cardboard. I silently concluded that we'd had to buy the cheapest option, although it was probably more to do with portion size than money.