In this paper, we return to Max Weber’s distinction between class and status as related but different forms of social stratification. We argue that this distinction is not only conceptually cogent, but that class and status do have differing explanatory power in different areas of social life. Consistent with Weber’s argument, we show that economic security and prospects are stratified more by class than by status, while the opposite is true for outcomes in the domain of cultural consumption. As for politics, we show that it is class rather than status which predicts the choice between voting Conservative or Labour in British general elections. Class also predicts ‘Left–Right’ political attitudes. But it is status rather than class which predicts ‘Libertarian–Authoritarian ’ attitudes. 1

Family income is found to be more closely related to sons ’ earnings for a cohort born in 1970 compared to one born in 1958. This result is in stark contrast to the finding on the basis of social class; intergenerational mobility for this outcome is found to be unchanged. We set up a formal framework which relates mobility in measured family income/earnings to mobility in social class. Building on this framework we then test a number of hypotheses to explain the difference between the trends. We reject Erikson and Goldthorpe’s (2009) assertion that the divergent results are driven by the poorer measure of permanent family income in the 1958 cohort. Instead we find evidence of an increase in the intergenerational persistence of the permanent component of income that is unrelated to social class. Acknowledgements: We would like to thank Anders Björklund, Stephen Machin, Sandra McNally, Elizabeth

The paper examines three issues in the identification of a possible “middle class” using data from LIS. It considers first definitions based purely on income, examining the rationale for different approaches and illustrating the implications for changes over time. It argues that any interpretation in terms of “class” requires the examination of dimensions other than income. The second part of the paper considers the composition of income and the role of property. Drawing on the sociological literature, the third part investigates what can be said about the role of occupations.