The only way one can claim that the middle class isn’t shrinking is to have a floating definition of the middle class.

If you lock it in any way to something like “home ownership and simple vacations once a year” (which was absolutely possible in the 90s), it has plummeted.

I always mention this in these discussions:

https://worksinprogress.co/issue/the-housing-theory-of-every...

It's housing prices.