137 Comments

1. I didn’t grow up poor, I grew up in middle class home with parents who were both educated professionals. But I always always always feel like this:

   “In contrast, I seemed to feel that I should always be suffering a little. That my default state should be one of discomfort, because I did not belong there.”

   I wonder why? How common is this? I’m a young associate at a law firm, so I graduated in the crash and have always felt a hint of imposter syndrome, maybe that’s part of it? Even though I just came off three 60 hour billed weeks, I’m being hard on myself for billing average 40 hour weeks. Any one have tips for getting rid of this harmful attitude?

   1. So I have this issue too, that I feel I should “earn my keep”, rushing down the hall, and fighting not to round down my hours. I grew up pretty solidly middle class (public school, coupons, drove to local vacation spots rather than big trips, but no food or clothing insecurity). I make more money now than my parents did combined.

      I think the difference is that I did not go through the typical hiring process in Biglaw. I was turned down by multiple big firms during OCI (granted it was 2009-2010). I lucked into a position after a clerkship due to a contact. I graduated top ten percent of my class, but from a state school (there’s an Ivy down the road that’s considered the best school in the area). My undergrad was also a state school. I still feel like I need to show I was worth hiring and that I’m not a fraud. My resume is much less prestigious than the people I work with.

      1. I know how you feel, but remind yourself that you have the same job as all those Ivy leaguers! And you hustled to get it, which, in my mind, is much more impressive than just gliding in on the strength of a perfect resume. You have just as much of a right to be there as they do, if not more.

2. Somehow I feel this post should be titled: “When the culture in Big Law is Foreign to You”. To me this isn’t really about poverty because although some of the things the poster discusses could also be experienced by people who are not well off but also not necessarily from abject poverty. And also some things she mentions may not necessarily be restricted to Big Law they could also apply to other corporate cultures where people are high earners. Skimping on clothes purchases could also apply to some middle class families trying to stretch their money farther by say choosing to buy from a thrift store. Hand washing may seem like the mark of poverty, but in some countries it is the norm and sometimes it is the option that makes sense for really delicate fabrics. And now with the whole “organic, earth friendly” movement, some people will opt out of dry cleaning because of the chemicals used.

   I did not grow up in abject poverty but I experienced some of what she is describing in my first job. For example attending a formal dinner with multiple courses at a 5 star hotel where you have all this cutlery and you wonder which is the dessert fork? And I know I’m not the only one, I’ve seen others experience the same only that they might joke about it. Even with a high income, some things still wouldn’t make sense to me such as paying more than $1,000 for shoes for example, even though others may consider such a purchase necessary.

   I think this post would have been more useful if the poster would have offered strategies for people encountering “foreign” corporate cultures to cope and not feel like they stick out like a sore thumb. Such as how to get over the “imposter syndrome”–which seems more common among women, how to navigate dinners that feel awkward–In grad school I once attended a dinner event where someone broke all this down etc. Right now it seems self deprecating to me, and not in a good way.

   1. This is why we need this post. Because we can’t even listen to people talk about what being poor is like without devaluing their experience and seeking to make it something middle class people can use too.

      1. +1

         1. Tritto

      2. Harshly put, but I agree with this point. I notice a reflex, on posts like this, to say that disadvantaged people are misinterpreting their own experiences–“hey that happens to me too!” It’s OK (preferable) to sometimes just listen to someone else’s perspective. And taking them at their word when they say they had unique difficulties does not denigrate your own life or accomplishments.

         1. @Monday I’m not sure what in my post suggests that she is misinterpreting her experiences. Neither was my intention to “devalue” her experiences or appropriate them for the middle class as some of the posters think. I was simply trying to point out that this feeling of not fitting in is not limited to those who grow up poor only.

            And ironically, these sentiments are borne out by some of the examples people have given on this page, in their own words:
            –Growing up in working class families or “average middle class” families where fancy clothes or vacations are not the norm
            –Experiencing hardship as a student–see post by @roses
            –Immigrants–some come from poverty but others don’t. However when they go to a new country they are subjected to it when building a new life from scratch.

            Also the beginning of the post: “How does your background — like growing up poor — affect your life in Big Law or other conservative jobs?”. To me that implies that being poor is one among a couple of situations that can affect how someone feels they fit or don’t fit in when they find themselves in such jobs.

            1. It sounded like you felt she was misinterpreting because she attributed her experiences to being poor, where you said: “this isn’t really about poverty because although some of the things the poster discusses could also be experienced by people who are not well off but also not necessarily from abject poverty.”

            2. Exactly.

            3. +1 to Monday.

               There’s nothing wrong with sharing your own (middle class) experience, or pointing out how her experience had features in common with yours, but to say this “really isn’t about poverty” is to show a fundamental lack of understanding of (and lack of interest in?) what poverty is, how it is experienced, and its legacy for those who live through it.

               Your comment, to me, was the equivalent of, if the poster had been writing about her experience as an under-represented minority, saying in response that “this isn’t really about being a URM.” Ummm, yes, yes it is.

            4. +10000 to Killer Kitten Heels

               As an URM, this is exactly how it feels when others change the focus of the discussion. It ends up as poorly executed solidarity.

               Hardship as a student is common. There is a world of difference between student hardship where there are tons of free activities, student discounts, exercise facilities, housing, tons of people your age to socialize with, and a clear end date of poverty, compared to multi-generational poverty in which many people think they will never escape and do not. Whenever I hear people say that the best time in their life was when they had the least money, and they refer to their college years, I realize that their background is at least middle class, because college provides a lot of support for students that young people of poor backgrounds do not have at that age if they are not attending college.

      3. +1

      4. I agree with this point as well.

      5. +1

      6. +1

      7. Yes, people who have relative privilege in a situation may want to say, “Me too,” out of solidarity, but it often comes across as tone-deaf to make false equivalencies.

         It seems like a specific ettiquette class for socioeconomic class changers could be useful. In addition to learning which spoon to use and when, the behaviors and thought patterns of the upper classes would be taught.

         I hope the discussion stays focused on those who grew up in poverty, because there is such a huge difference in experience. For example, from my obeservations, poor children are taught to be obedient and non-poor children are taught to negotiate.

         1. “It seems like a specific etiquette class for socioeconomic class changers could be useful.”

            My law school actually offered these types of events through career services – they were billed as general etiquette classes that were “open to all,” but the makeup of those who attended made it pretty clear who it was for. I’m still grateful – I learned a number of “life hack”-type tricks that carried me through my first few years in Biglaw. Some were concrete – which fork to use, how to figure out which fork to use if the place setting is unfamiliar (look to the hostess or most senior person at the table), how to figure out what to order (for example, “What’s everyone thinking of getting?” or “Have you been here before? What would you recommend?” as a way of figuring out whether or not I’m supposed to be ordering an appetizer) – and others were more general – for example, if someone brings up something I’ve never done (never been to Paris, never sailed, never golfed, etc.), instead of jumping in with “I’ve never done that,” (my knee-jerk response, at first) asking questions about the other person’s experience (How was the trip/the water/the course?). Most people are so happy to talk about themselves they never notice that you’re not contributing your own “the last time I was in Paris” story.

            I also did a lot of reading on business and negotiation at the suggestion of the career services office – it helped me understand how negotiating works, and how white collar workplaces in general work. For the clothing part of it, I have to tip my hat to “What Not To Wear” – that show was my dressing-myself-bible for awhile (and also taught me the importance of investing in a really good haircut!)

            I’ve learned how to “pass” pretty well at this point (and I’m lucky enough to have been born white, so as long as I’m in “the uniform” the general assumption, at least here in the Northeast, is that I’m “one of them”). But I don’t think it ever stops feeling like “passing.”

            1. You had a really great career services program! I’m taking notes because even after years in the business world I don’t always know how to handle the Last Time In Paris convo.

         2. I feel like those who grew up poor have a different set of values. Being in big law or making a lot of money feels different – and we constantly just feel grateful about it – not that others don’t feel grateful, but that those who grew up poor might voice that a lot. And that gratefulness, at the same time, might even come off as looking “weak” – by being too humble, by being too grateful, and then it seems like you would be giving off a vibe of being too forgiving to be “aggressive.”

            Not sure if this comment is making any sense but hope I got my point across.

         3. “For example, from my obeservations, poor children are taught to be obedient and non-poor children are taught to negotiate”

            This is my experience. Being poor, you are taught generally to “suck it up” and thus will put up with all sorts of bad situations in order to simply not to lose a job. Children of well-to-do families are taught to negotiate or leave bad situations much more quickly.

         4. +1 to Alana and Killer Kitten Heels. There is a study backing up what Alana just said. It focuses on the sociology of education; kids growing up in low-income/poor performing schools are trained to follow orders, arrive on time, not talk back, and be disciplined. Which prepares them for jobs where they are punching in and out a time card and taking orders. In contrast, the same study found kids from wealthy/elite schools are told that they have the right to negotiate with teachers and they don’t need a hall pass to leave the room, because staff/faculty trust them. You can imagine the ways that this plays out in the professional world. People from privileged backgrounds come into Big Law jobs with a level of confidence and comfort that benefits them. They give off the air that they are already leaders and they speak up for themselves accordingly. This post should really encourage us to think about ways that we can ask Big Law (and other corporate environments) to evaluate their culture and the ways that they are not accommodating for people from diverse economic backgrounds. The study was by Jean Anyon. Journal of Education, Vol. 162, no. 1, Fall 1980

      8. +100

   2. The point of the post wasn’t to help you figure out what forks to use, it was for the author to share her story and the cognitive dissonance that working in Biglaw created for her, and perhaps spark discussion about it.

3. I think that there are at least two types of poor: not-having-enough-money poor and chronic family dysfunction / something has gone terribly wrong poor. My parents were the former (outhouse poor but in a family that valued reading, which was their education).

   I went to court the summer before I went to law school. I saw a lawyer do a horrible job. At that moment, I knew with certainty, that if he could do it, I could do it.

   I do think that law firms are funny creatures. Partners come from one zip code. New lawyers who are from here tend to come from that zip code or ones close to it. Staff comes from everywhere else. I’m pretty sure that people would do well to be exposed to something besides “You can’t not go to XYZ Country Day; the schools around here are horrible and your child will never amount to anything.” Very Preppy Handbook.

   1. Exactly. The deserving poor and the undeserving poor. #dickens. Heaven forbid someone grow up in a family that is both poor and doesn’t value reading.

      1. Oh good grief. She was expressing gratitude that while she may have grown up cash-poor, she was at least fortunate to have a supportive family that reduced some of the barriers to her becoming an attorney–and that others may not be so lucky and we should all be more aware of the challenges that group has overcome while clawing up to professional roles. You’re the one inventing the “undeserving” aspect.

   2. You make a good point about the different types of poverty. My dad had a blue collar job and my mom was a SAHM, but both had college degrees and came from families that spoke with correct english grammar, valued reading and education, and expected each generation to do better than the previous one. I think that conferred a lot of advantages on me that someone whose family with the same income level might not have had. That said, the first lawyer I ever met was at law school orientation. I had no clue what I was getting into, and that put me at a distinct disadvantage compared with my classmates who knew the ins and outs of the system.

      1. That’s what I’m getting at. There are plenty of people who don’t have money, but there are subgroups that have problems beyond that. If you can think of situations where grandparents are raising their grandchildren, that’s a lot harder. Throw in some parents with mental / drug problems and some prison, absent parents who won’t or can’t pay support, mom’s new boyfriend is a molester . . . you get the idea.

         My very vanilla poverty is still shocking to some people I work with. They cannot conceive that my grandparents had an outhouse and that’s what my parents (born at home, not in a hospital) grew up with. And yet, here I am, working with them. A lot is possible in this world, sometimes against very great odds (my neighbors left Vietnam in a boat — a boat! — and came here with nothing and not even speaking the language). But I hate, HATE, that so much of what I hear dismisses people based on where they started and stuff that is totally beyond someone’s control. A cross I bear from this is that I am very hard on people I see who have such great opportunities who nevertheless squander them (some in-laws: grew up very comfortable and yet are still dependent on parents into their 40s).

         I had no idea what a crabcake was the first time I had one. I had read about them, but never actually tasted one.

         1. Hmm. I think of it like this – I was raised by a single mom and I got free school lunches, but I’m white and fit and my mom had a mortgage that she got a second on so I could go to college. Lots of people have to work badly paying jobs immediately after high school because even if you get a full ride scholarship that won’t send money to pay rent, and working at MAACO will. So even though I grew up literally poor I still had a well packed invisible knapsack of privilege. I like the “don’t think you hit a home run because you were born on third base” cliche.

            So it’s less that my parents valued reading and more than white privilege society had set me up with the ability to leverage wealth even with below-poverty-level income.

         2. I completely understand the distinction and see it often in the area where I live. My husband grew up working poor with parents who did not have other problems. I would say things that vary between him and I now absolutely reflect our socioeconomic upbringings. He is far more likely than I am to buy clothes because I grew up shopping for new clothes twice per year and still kind of stick to that schedule. He grew up wearing clothes from Goodwill so while he has trouble paying a lot of money for anything, he enjoys being able to walk into Target, etc. and buying a pair of shorts because he can. However, he really needs my help to purchase suits and business casual attire because he is still really unsure of what is appropriate and “in” but not overly trendy and classic but not outdated. It is really hard for him to spend money on intagibles like vacation, theater, etc. which can make it hard to have those “familiar” conversations with coworkers superiors who talk about going to Europe or Bora Bora for Christmas. His first vacation was when he was 30 years old (to visit a friend in Florida) and he really feels like he needs something tangible to show for money spent. He does very well because he is very clever, quick on his feet, and smart, but sometimes I notice that I know things that he doesn’t just because of how/where I grew up. As for the crabcake thing, I can’t tell you how many “new” foods my family and I have introduced to him. He just didn’t have the kind of opportunities I did to try new things, which again can make it difficult when someone decides to take you to Legal Sea Foods or wherever for lunch and you’ve only ever had fishsticks.

         3. Some rich people have drug and alcohol problems, marry molesters and behave poorly and/or dysfunctionally and not everybody living n poverty has these experiences. Some of the comments here are disgusting.

            1. I didn’t read it like that at all.

               Social class is a thing that is entangled with but not identical to income level. So a person who grew up very poor but with educated parents is more likely to speak like an educated person, and therefore more likely to be read as a member of a higher social class, which opens up opportunities that someone who may have had the same exact amount of money growing up would not have. This is basically what code-switching is all about. That has nothing to do with dysfunction, actually, but it has a lot to do with generational poverty.

               As far as dysfunction goes, yes, there is dysfunction in wealthy families, but dysfunction amplifies the effects of poverty.

   3. Agreed. I find it very hard to hear a partner I work for compare his childhood in poverty to that of the teenage girl I mentor. He is the child of parents who battled with some psychological disorders and alcoholism, but who were both extremely well-educated and encouraged (and achieved) the same in their children. His father was a partner at a big local firm that is now a megafirm. But they were ne’er-do-wells who apparently squandered their money and often neglected their parental duties. I can’t begin to explain how frustrated I get when he tries to match my stories of my mentee, who has spent her entire life being “educated” in terrible schools and living in housing projects rife with crime, whose father has been in and out of jail and rarely paid a cent of support and whose mother has not had a job in ten years. Their experiences are incomparable.

      1. I agree that this is comparing apples and oranges, but don’t completely discount the damage having mentally unstable, alcoholic parents can do to a person.

         1. Agreed. Did not mean to discount it at all. I just don’t think it creates the same barriers to achievement in academic/professional contexts that having parents without a high school diploma between them, who never ate in a restaurant with table service, and don’t own a single book other than the Bible does. I think he had to work harder to achieve, but at least he had a cleared pathway and someone who’d been down it.

4. I didn’t grow up below the poverty line, but I did come from a lower-middle-class family in a working-class neighborhood. Although I dealt with the culture shock part of what Ruth is discussing when I first went to undergrad in a big city, I still was absolutely poor (since I paid for all living expenses, etc myself during school) until I started working for Biglaw. I’m about to finish paying off my loans after 2 years of Biglaw and for the first time I will have a disposable income, and yet I’m still terrified of spending money. In fact, there is one certain luxury item (costing about $1500) that I have always wanted that I always said I’d buy the day I paid off my loans – and now that the day is coming and I’m not sure I can actually go through with buying it, even though everyone in my life tells me I deserve it. I’m not sure I’ll ever be able to – or should? – shake the feeling that spending more money than it takes to have a modestly comfortable life is a stupid idea.

5. I think this could easily describe those of us who came from average middle-class backgrounds that were nowhere near the high-income lifestyle of big law lawyers. My parents had decent middle-class jobs and saved every penny to put myself and my siblings through private schools where they thought we’d get a better education (we lived in places where the public schools were very bad), but we didn’t take vacations, we only got gifts at Christmas and our birthdays, and even then we never got the expensive lego sets, Barbies etc that some of our friends got. We went shopping for clothes once a year, before school started, and wore stuff from J.C. Penny’s and Macys. It’s a HUGE culture shock to work in an office where every person’s vacation is to an exotic foreign country, the women wear Manolos and Louboutins while the men wear custom-made suits, and people fly business class on regular vacations (ie when the firm’s not paying) and everything thinks this lifestyle is normal and if you don’t do that, something must be wrong with you. Also the women associates and partners judge each other by the size of their diamond engagement rings (I wish I was making this up, but unfortunately it’s true). It’s very hard to live day to day in a culture where people make comments about how we make so much money and it’s no problem to pay for $500 last-night plane tickets, buy their wives $10,000 jackets etc, especially when I’m paying off over $250K in student loans and so don’t have the same discretionary spending amount as everyone else (I am one of only 2 associates in my department who have student loans).

   1. Totally agree. My parents were unable to help me at all with law school, and I have some loans from undergrad. I know many of my classmates’ parents paid their full tuition + living expenses for both. They took cab rides to hot clubs while wearing trendy designer outfits during law school while I largely avoided clothes shopping and limited myself to no-cover bars within walking/public transit distance (or just didn’t go out). Even if I had a big law job making the same salary, we’d still have vastly different lifestyles due to our different levels of disposable income. That has made me feel like an outsider all through law school and continues to now that we have graduated.

      1. Anonymous and Yep, I’ve appreciated both of your perspectives. Please don’t be discouraged by the people who feel the need to set themselves up as the arbiters of whether your contributions are valid (which, seriously, WTF?). Corporette is valuable precisely because of the various perspectives shared.

   2. I think you’ve both missed the point. There’s a big difference between being middle class and working/ going to school with upper class people and doing the same, but coming from a lower class/poor background.

      1. Completely and totally missed the point.

         1. I read the post in part as the author sharing the ways in which she felt like an outsider. The point of my comment is to share that I also feel/have felt like an outsider. I probably would feel that way to a greater extent if I had not worked at an entry-level job in an industry comparable to big law before law school and thereby gained some familiarity with people from very privileged socioeconomic backgrounds. I am not sure why you and “gin” are asserting that I missed the point? I am not asserting that my experience is the same as the post author’s, just that I have also felt like an outsider due to not having grown up wealthy (or currently being wealthy). Apparently that is not a valid contribution to this discussion in the eyes of some.

            1. Given the context of Ruth’s post, I really don’t think the contribution is valid. Being middle class is the norm, you don’t have to work against anything to be this way. Coming from a poor family is very different from coming from a family that was able to send you to private school or help you with financing college. It’s just not the same and when someone says, “I think this could easily describe those of us who came from average middle-class backgrounds that were nowhere near the high-income lifestyle of big law lawyers,” it discounts the experiences of people who actually did grow up poor (like only getting clothes when the local thrift store had $5 for a bag of clothes sale, not only shopping at JCPenney and Macy’s). There are serious differences between being middle class and poor and acting like it’s a similar experience because oh-my-god-I-feel-so-different! isn’t helpful to the discussion.

            2. Oh (re: post below, for some reason there is no reply button), I didn’t go to private school (terrible inner city public school), so I guess I don’t “totally agree” with anonymous’s post, just partially agree. Again, I didn’t mean to imply that it was similar, just that I also know what it’s like to feel like an outsider. Even though I do get the point of the article, I guess I will just back out of this discussion, seeing that my contributions are not “helpful.”

            3. Gin, do we really have to go around telling people who are commenting in good faith that their contributions are “not valid”? The post was not about how difficult it is to live in poverty, it was about it being different than the typical background of a person in big law. Even if it wasn’t exactly what you would have said or reflected circumstances entirely the same as those of the author, it is still a valid statement to make.

      2. OMG, stop being a see you next Tuesday. Your self-righteous “You’re middle class so you can’t participate” and verdict that her comments are not valid are insufferable.

         1. +1

   3. I don’t know about your background, but it seems to me that many times, people expect little to nothing of poor people. For example, many poor people think the only way they would work in a law firm is as a janitor, or if they’re lucky, support staff. Middle class kids often get the message that they can succeed with hard work, and people expect them to attend college.

      There are different levels of being an outsider. Class is a mixed bag.

      I grew up in a rental sharing a room with my brother, but my parents went to graduate school and we had a subscription to the Sunday NYT which exposed me to another way of life so that when I met people who have summer homes, it was less of a shock.

6. I wrote about this when we were talking about professionalism, but one of my privileges is that I know if I can learn the rules and follow them (like wearing suits) I can just fit in to this extremely privileged situation and nobody even knows how much I didn’t grow up like this. I went through all my culture shock in college and think I now benefit from knowing how both halves live. Also, I think its important to realize how rich we are. I live in a HCOL and have a tiny apartment but I make more than the national average for a household. It’s easy to compare yourself to your neighbors and forget how stinking rich you are.

7. My family was very poor (snap, free lunches, wic, the works,4 adults and 2 children in a 2br apartment) until I was 14 and then my dad finished graduate school and suddenly we were middle class when he got a job. I can see what posters are saying with feeling a cultural disconnect with biglaw/professional jobs when you are from either background, but I have to say that there is just a HUGE leap in feeling uncomfortable in your own skin when you are very, very poor. It is magnitudes worse than when you are coming into it from a middle class background in my opinion and the constant crawling feeling of anxiety about whether or not you are missing the cultural references people are making or you’re about to embarrass yourself are huge. At this point, I’m established enough that I’m very confident in myself, my work and my position and can talk about my experiences growing up very matter of factly.

   1. It is unfortunate that it took you (the collective) to be well-established and comfortable to be able to speak about your (the collective) growing-up experiences matter-of-factly. That, to me, is a bigger problem with our society in general.

      The “invisible backpack” is an interesting concept–and one that I wear as well. My parents were blue-white collar when I was growing up. Dad worked as an editor at the newspaper, mom was SAH until I was in middle school, when she went back to work (she had freelanced prior to having kids) part-time at the newspaper editing also, in order to put me and my big sister through school. In choosing universities, an out-of-state was my top choice. Mom said that she would be able to afford tuition and some necessary expenses, but it would be up to me to get loans, or figure out how to pay for the rest. Including payment for my own transportation to and from that university. For better or worse, I chose my #2 school which was in-state. I graduated with no loans to pay off, and entered a low-level, but technical position in a professional field. From the other side of the coin, I often feel uncomfortable with people talking about paying off their loans, or how much loan they have, because I didn’t have any. The backpack of privilege is on my back, but really, only insofar as university. Every other aspect of growing up was solidly middle-class. I got my hair cut by my neighbor in her garage. We all clipped coupons, and we never paid full retail if we could avoid it. I learned to cook from scratch, and how to do a lot of simple home repairs. The idea of spending even $150 on a pair of shoes makes me uncomfortable.

8. I have always liked Jen Dziura’s take on this issue: http://www.thegloss.com/2010/10/14/career/social-class-in-the-office/

   1. I was going to post that exact same article!

9. The one thing that kills me about law firms (and big law firms) is they seem so insular and snobbish. No people from State U if we can get people from Sparkly Private College. No people from non-flagship campuses of State U (even if they got a full ride based on merit). I knew someone who was nice enough, but his wife was just horrified that their son (private school, boarding school, private college) was dating someone bridge-and-tunnel. I guess she didn’t realize that that was me (not dating her son, but not from her side of the Hudson).

   I will always have a soft spot for Working Girl.

   1. That’s what I liked about my public law school. They took smart people from all over. Even people who went to Ohio, the horrors.

      1. There are a lot of people from “Sparkly Private Colleges” who grew up below the poverty line too. I have three ivy league degrees but we grew up not being able to afford 3 meals a day and living with both of my parents in one room in my uncle’s house, which was also really run down in an area with rampant crime and drug issues. We were well below the poverty line, but now people assume that I’ve always been a spoiled rich girl. Like, my in laws make snide remarks about that all the time.

         Just saying that sparkly private college isn’t always the best proxy for financial security.

         1. *This*

         2. I went to a royal school on scholarship. All my clothes were thrifted. I didn’t have meals off campus (because we had meal plan included in the scholarship). I stayed every weekend on campus because I couldn’t afford paying for the bus ($7) to go home like everyone else (who drove their personal cars)

      2. If you’re really that smart, wouldn’t you be going to an Ivy League law school, not a public one?

   2. In academics, the snobbery along these lines is also astonishing.

   3. I agree with what you’re saying, but people who go to private schools aren’t automatically more wealthy than people who go to public schools and vice versa and the generalization drives me bonkers.

      I’m from a lower middle class family that went to an expensive private school on a full academic scholarship. My parents are immigrants and put every single penny they earned into my sister and I’s education, resulting in a tough upbringing but a great education.

      On the other hand, my supervising partner is from an upper middle class family (country clubs, multiple generations of family silver, etc.), but she attended a state school for college (not top in the state but certainly not a “bad” school) followed by another less-than-prestigious law school. The chip she has on her shoulder over this is astonishing, and I’m genuinely shocked at the assumptions that I know she’s made about me and my upbringing based solely on the diplomas on my wall. I know she’s made these assumptions based on a slew of passive aggressive (and sometimes outward aggressive) comments that I’ve received throughout the years I’ve worked with her.

      This guest poster is talking about being poor in Big Law. She said nothing about what law school she went to. I think it says a lot that you automatically conflated the two (about society in general, not necessarily about you).

      1. This isn’t what I think at all. It’s what my firm does. And this is more the attitude for what is acceptable in those families and that spills over into work.

         My sense is that many academically-great private schools give generally need-based aid since everyone there has merit. And that they are more generous than State U. Maybe I’m wrong, but I do work with people who went to Private U over Public U b/c Public U is less-expensive and affordable to more people, but not able to give as much aid (so eliminating many poor and middle-class out-of-state students). I do fundraising for Public U (which I attended but would be priced out of today).

         At any rate, I wouldn’t ding someone for starting at community college, but I may be the exception.

         1. Nah, I think you misunderstood (or I should say, I did a poor job of articulating my point). See Anonymous’ comment above. She nailed what I was trying to say. I don’t think that you think it’s right to discriminate based on education. But your comment sounded like you were assuming that *Sparkly Private School* = privileged and I was just pointing out that that’s not always the case. That’s all.

            I think I’m particularly sensitive to this generalization because it happens to me a lot. Just thought I would point it out because it appeared to be a totally unconscious generalization that you made.

            (It is interesting, though, because I think it gives me a little of a glimpse into how frustrating it probably is for those who truly are very well off to have people discount their accomplishments constantly. I know, I know, these are such terrible serious issues, however do I sleep at night…?)

            1. I think sparkly private school does make you now have a privilege. I agree that rich people go to public school and poor people go to private school, but once you have a collection of sparkly degrees you have a lot of privilege, even if its not the privilege of coming from money.

10. I come from a lower middle class background. My mom stayed home with us. HER parents were definitely working class and struggled.

    My husband comes from a working class background. We met in graduate school, each of us making very little money but paying our own way without any money from family or incurring huge loans.

    We still have trouble spending money on ourselves and we are mid forties.

    I am not in Big Law, and would not describe my back ground as “poor”, but have a similar kind of culture shock to the type the author describes. Many of my colleagues come from very wealthy backgrounds and are status conscious.

    It’s a bit bizarre but I just try to “do me”, while at the same time slowly elevating my work wardrobe etc.

11. Super interesting post. What if anything can supervisors at the office do to help new folks adjust to what might be a different culture? We just hired a new employee who I believe is the first person in her family to go to college and had to give her a signing bonus (not normal for us) so she would have enough money to move her for the job. And part of this job is lunches and dinners at fancy ish places. So far she has done great, seems confident and comfortable in the different situations she has been in — but is there anything as her employer I can or should do?

    1. I think it is something you just have to do enough times to be comfortable. My husband pointed out when we were dating that I looked visibly uncomfortable in some very fancy restaurants or going to his parent’s Country Club. Overtime I just got used to doing it. In between I started seeing it as acting where I was just playing one of these fancy people.

       Maybe you can take her for more meals (that you buy) in fancier places so that she becomes more comfortable before she has to be “on” at a large client event. I just wouldn’t mention that you are doing it for that reason. Just a general, “hey, can I buy you lunch today at Chez Fancy?”

       1. Second this. One of the partners at my firm is super religious and at our summer lunch actually talked us through table settings in a “let’s talk about this now so that when you become an associate at our firm and have to go to client dinners, you won’t feel uncomfortable” which was a nice thing even if I’ve known since 7th grade.

          The harder part for me is that my partners come from hardworking bootstraps backgrounds while I come from a doubly ivy somewhat privileged background… gah.

          1. What does his/her being super religious have to do with it?

       2. Keep in mind that the primary goal of etiquette is to make everyone feel comfortable. I was at a legal conference lunch one time and the person next to me started to use the wrong bread plate. Rather than just not use a bread plate, or otherwise go with the flow, her fellow diner called her out for using the wrong one. You could just feel the embarrassment of this poor woman.
          I was the nerd that loved to read the etiquette books growing up and think fancy table settings are fun. But, I was so irritated at this exchange and how this person missed the whole point.

          1. +25. It’s not about the rules themselves, it’s about how the rules allow people to act civilly.

    2. Where I live now, golf is very much a thing in law firms and with clients. So: maybe golf clinic for incoming hires? Expose everyone to what it takes to be successful. I wouldn’t make a special exception for a notably poor-by-upbringing hire, but I’d give everyone the tools they need to succeed and encourage them.

       So what is like that where you work besides eating out? Maybe shopping for clothes to wear — many firms here do discount days at the more work-appropriate stores and they are open an hour or so later, have a presentation, give you a discount, and let you shop (sometimes with other employers’ new hires).

    3. I would say be sensitive, but don’t make assumptions. Don’t assume that she doesn’t know what crabcakes are but don’t act shocked and appalled if it becomes apparent that she doesn’t. Just be aware that not everyone has the same life experiences and proceed accordingly. I think you’ve already done pretty great just by giving her the signing bonus. When I went to law school it was an endless source of frustration that people didn’t get that I didn’t have some outside source of cash to front those kinds of expenses, e.g. the study abroad program that required a multi-thousand dollar deposit months before that semester’s loan disbursements arrived. I definitely burst into tears in the financial aid office when some clueless person said, “Just get the money from your parents.”

       1. I wouldn’t JUST give this to the particular associate, but Miss Manners is wonderful for someone entering the professional world for the first time. Maybe get a few office reference copies and let people know they’re available?

          http://smile.amazon.com/Miss-Manners-Guide-Turn—Millennium/dp/067172228X/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1412275895&sr=8-2-fkmr0&keywords=miss+manners+guide+new+millenium

    4. This isn’t really for supervisors, more for hiring managers, but I noticed (when going through hiring) a distinct lack of empathy at some places for people without the resources to support them in a traditional “rich kid” college/law school experience.

       Example: I wasn’t on a law review or other time-intensive extracurriculars because I was working 3 jobs to scrape together the $12,000/year I needed to cover my “estimated family contribution” because parental finances were a mess and didn’t include “help KKH pay for law school.” (My parents, while basically working class, are the “best-off” of their many siblings, and ended up with a lot of financial responsibilities tied to “helping out” siblings/aging parents as a result.)

       I could always tell the firms where I’d be dinged for being a fish-out-of-water apart from those where I’d likely be okay by how they reacted to my answer to “why didn’t you do moot court/law review/etc.?” The places where the interviewer winced, or rolled their eyes, or said something awkward or borderline-rude about “my judgment” (seriously, I had more than one interviewer basically suggest I’d been “irresponsible” by taking on part-time employment while in law school full time) were the firms I stayed away from. When the interviewers were able to respond empathetically (or at least, able to avoid acting like I’d committed a grave moral failing by prioritizing “roof and food” over “prestigious” extracurriculars), I knew I was likely to encounter a better fit. The places where the interviewer genuinely thought it was cool that I’d been a house painter/widget fixer/etc.? One of those places ended up being home for me.

       So if you want to create a workplace where you’re sensitive to employees coming from financially disadvantaged backgrounds, please keep in mind that it starts at the interview.

       1. I don’t know that I buy that as a good excuse for not doing a journal though. My estimated family contribution was 100% because my parents are well off, but they didn’t pay for my law school. So I took out loans to cover it. I don’t really see it as a poor/not poor distinction but as “are you prioritizing your education while you’re in school” thing. I think it’s fair to ding someone for choosing to work instead of doing journal. And for the record, I know plenty of people, myself included, who earned >$10K per year while in school by doing part time work and also did a journal. So yeah, I think it’s fair for you to get dinged for that.

          1. I worded this poorly – what I meant was my parents didn’t just not pay for my tuition, they also didn’t give me any money while I was in school so I took out loans to cover the cost of housing/food too.

             1. But if your parents are well off, you had a safety net so if your job became too much, then you could quit and focus on your journal. Give me a break.

             2. You’re making a lot of incorrect assumptions about my family. If I had gone to them and said “I need money so I can quit my job and focus on journal” their response would have been “you should have planned better.” Not everyone who has rich parents has the option of getting money from them.

          2. Seriously? Oh come on.

          3. It’s not about the ding, it’s about the attitude, which you’re actually representing pretty well here.

             I’m super-glad for you that you didn’t have to make the choice between eating or editing some junior professor’s latest article into the wee hours of the night, but seriously, this is precisely the type of dismissive behavior I’m talking about – you were able to do a journal, so clearly I’m just lying about my financial situation and what I needed to do to get by to make excuses for why I wasn’t on a journal, as far as you’re concerned. I’m now placed in the uncomfortable position of basically having to bare my soul to you to “justify” my choice, and hoping that the litany of horrors I went through to afford to stay in law school is “enough” to convince you I’m “worthy.” Oh, and if I were to actually do that? You’d judge me anyway for what I went through. So it’s a no-win situation. I’m thankful I don’t work for, with, or near you, and that’s all I really have to say about that.

             On the bright side, I DID go to an Ivy League law school, so the journal thing only mattered to about 2 in 10 people, and hasn’t stopped me from working in Biglaw, holding a federal clerkship, or doing pretty much anything else I’ve wanted to do, so the time I spent working to continue to afford my law school education has paid off tenfold, in the long run.

             1. Wow. You sound extremely defensive. You are allowed to prioritize other things over journal, and other people are allowed to make extra sacrifices to be on journal. They are both valid choices. You can choose one path, someone else can choose a different path, and you probably will fit better with people who lean towards choosing the same path as you, or don’t subtly/overtly criticize your path even if they wouldn’t do the same.

                That does not mean that someone who chooses a different path (or understands why your chosen path might be a valid reason to ding you) is accusing you of lying or requiring you to justify yourself or judging you for the litany of horrors you endured. Your comment (that you’re thankful you don’t work for, with or near Anonymous at 4:34 because she has a different opinion) also sounds extremely dismissive of anyone who has a different opinion than you or who would make different life choices for different reasons.

             2. Was going to respond, but forget it. You’re not worth it.

             3. Yup. What a jerk. Good riddance.

             4. I’m Anonymous @ 4:34. I never said you were lying about your financial situation. Please don’t put words in my mouth. You may very well have been dinged for snobbish reasons, and that’s wrong. For the record, I would think it was awesome if a law student said they painted houses or cleaned toilets or did any other kind of physical labor as a part time job. I think it shows a certain work ethic that a lot of privileged people who have only worked desk jobs don’t have. My point was just that while you may have been dinged for the wrong reasons, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to ding someone for not doing a journal, regardless of whether or not that person has a privileged background. Your personal attacks against me were nasty and utterly uncalled for.

             5. Definitely not worth it. The blindness to one’s own privilege evident from many of the comments on this thread is mind-boggling.

             6. I’m actually with Anon on this. I also did had zero parental help when paying for law school and my parents would not have been able to help me to pay for law school anyway, even though they totally would have if they could have. I took out essentially 100% student loans to cover my way through a t14 law school. I did do a little bit of part-time (mostly on weekends) work to help finance law school but relied almost exclusively on loans to get me through b/c i chose to prioritize law school and i felt like it was worth it to invest in my future 100% at that point. i’m not saying one person’s choice is right or wrong. If you chose to work during law school to help finance it, more power to you. But i agree with Anon that that was your choice. You could have taken out more loans to help you cover the cost and could have chosen to do extra-curricular activities. I had almost $200K in law school loans once i graduated and was able to start working (was deferred for a year) and have paid off all but $20K (i’m a fourth year now). it’s possible to not work during law school and rely on loans and still end up okay. Nobody’s experience is more valid than another’s. As an aside, i didn’t do journal or moot court and i have no regrets and no one has really questioned me on it so don’t actually think it’s that big an issue.

             7. “Nobody’s experience is more valid than another’s” is a meaningless comment. Your experience is your experience. But some people’s opinions or comments are definitely much, much more valuable than other’s. And I am appalled that someone who had an expected family contribution if 100% would try to think they understood because her parents didn’t give her money for law school.

                The biggest disconnect is the seemingly little things that more privileged people overlook, or discount as not that big a deal.. Parents who are able to give you a car, or even just consign for a loan, or pay for health insurance or a cell phone or a computer or a nice winter coat or a decent purse or transportation home for holidays or letting you live at home for the summer where you do t have to pay for groceries or laundry or toilet paper, and can introduce you to their friend X who is partner in a law firm, and who will pay for dinner out with no hesitation.

12. “I was always shocked when another associate would stick up for themselves or exercise self-preservation skills.”

    I wish I could remember what book I read that discussed how children from different socioeconomic backgrounds develop completely different social comfort zones. I mean, it’s obvious that they would, but one that I particularly remember being surprised at was how middle and upper class children are generally much more assertive and likely to advocate for themselves than children from poorer backgrounds. It seemed in contrast to another observation that children from poor families tend to be much more self-reliant and independent.

    I grew up solidly upper-middle class, and as a default, I tend to think “everything is negotiable” in a lot of situations, because I had a lot of examples when I was young of my parents and other adults working the system, or asking to talk to the boss if first-line person didn’t give them the answer they wanted. People from poorer backgrounds have had to work a lot harder and overcome a lot more obstacles to get to the same place I got to basically by cultural inertia, but I have consistently noticed that all that resolve evaporates and they defer to authority – even tiny, nominal bits of authority – much more readily. I can see how that, in particular, would make a big law or big corporate environment feel very foreign.

    1. Was it this one? http://www.amazon.com/Limbo-Blue-Collar-Roots-White-Collar-Dreams/dp/0471714399#

       1. My mom, who was the first in her family to go to college, found the Limbo book referenced above to be incredibly accurate and relatable.

       2. This book was also mentioned in the article two people mentioned above. Adding it to my reading list!

    2. How fascinating – I’m adding that book to my reading list!

       I grew up DIRT poor in a ROUGH inner-city neighborhood. The only time I think I really struggled with culture shock was in going to my very very wealthy very Southern VERY Greek private university the first 2 years of my college career. I was there on scholarship and financial aid and I was taking an intro to Italian course and all my peers of course had been to the country and fallen in love with it. Someone asked me once “OMG why have you not been??! You should go!!” and I didn’t have an appropriate response for that. In the professional world I’ve been in similar situations but the honest to god truth is that I’ve really been too busy honing my craft and then eventually going into business for myself that my big travel time just hasn’t happened yet.

       As for the other stuff, including ettiquette, etc. — thankfully I came of professional age in the world of Google and have been a tech geek since I was 19 or so (and had to buy my OWN computer because my parents wouldn’t/couldn’t), so I can figure out most of what I need to know most times.

       What does strike me is that nobody ever quite *believes* my background entirely when I tell them where I come from. It’s odd a little bit disturbing I guess, to still be of the belief that someone from THAT part of town can eventually become your peer or superior.

       In college I didn’t stick up for myself a lot but in the working world I do. I’m a master negotiator and it exhausts me but I can play hardball if I need to. Thankfully that only happens once every couple of years due to the nature of what I do.

       The hardest thing I think I face is having to live in both worlds — my world when I visit home is SO different than my world while I’m away in my city and working…I feel like I need a vacation from “vacation” when I go home to visit just to readjust and regroup and catch my breath.

       And, I feel guilt occasionally for feeling more comfortable in my new world vs. my old one.

13. I have had to take in three different nephews long-term at times when my siblings / the other parent / grandparents could not take care of them. They had trauma to deal with and were in school. I am single and have no children. I am the “successful” one and sometimes have to carry my family on my back. I love them and they need help, but this is not what my colleagues regularly (or irregularly) deal with.

    BigLaw has maternity leave and adoption leave, but not leave-for-stuff-like this.

    1. Thank you for sharing. It’s easy for people to ignore the effects of family poverty. As the “successful” one, some relatives may treat you as the family bank & lifeguard.

       1. And for other members of your family, you have “sold out” completely. Ugh.

    2. Wow. That’s intense. Good for you (and I mean that sincerely, not in the “bless your heart” way some folks say things).

    3. Although I understand your concerns for your family, BigLaw expects you to take care of yourself first. If you cannot, you will not succeed into BigLaw.
       My mum has the same pb you have- she feels guilty for being successful and finds her value in helping people. She is also surprised when she helps people unconditionnally and they do not do the same when they are in a better place.

       I remember reading “Dreams of my father” where Obama mentioned one of his Kenyan relatives who had the same issue. She was bright, had a lot of projects for herself. But invariably some family member would have an issue. And she “had to” help and delay her own projects. In the end, relatives got help. And she was left in the status quo.

14. I’m very far below the poverty line. I actually only made rent with 3 days to spare this month (because of tuition). Is frustrating that my employer thinks paying me for my internship (at a rate below the poverty line) is generous. I hand wash my silk blouses that I got for peanuts on clearance infact the women in my office were baffled silk could get wet. I’m not too sure why I’m saying this other than my frustrations with middle class people complaining that it’s so hard living on mommy and daddy’s dime and having no concept of rent or tuition, working part time for gas money for a car they were given.

    1. Don’t forget, for some, it isn’t worth working part time as a high school student if the pay is low and they are involved in extra-curricular activiites.

15. I did not grow up poor. My husband did, to a well-educated father and SAHM. The differences in what we knew/didn’t know are strange sometimes. He had never been on an airplane until he studied abroad in college. He also really struggled with buying suits anywhere other than Goodwill or JC Penney’s. He is polite and well-spoken, but definitely uncomfortable with our income level compared to what he had growing up.

    1. I’m late but I definitely identify with this. I grew up lower middle class and my husband grew up poor. His first plane ride was last year, at age 32. He was the first in his entire family, save one great-uncle, to attend college. This is my first year at a law firm, and it’s been interesting trying to gracefully pull him into these fancy events (client’s box seats at sporting events, horse shows, etc.). He has one suit we bought him a few years ago. Anyway, it’s been really interesting, and maybe it’s silly, but even though it’s out of his comfort zone a bit, I’m so happy to be able to share a life with him that’s certainly more comfortable than the one he grew up in.

16. I find travel to be a big, not friction point, but an area where I have felt “othered.” I went to Europe for the first time last year, which is incomprehensible to a lot of professional people I know, and it makes me feel like such an outsider when people talk about it like its nothing, like it’s assumed. I recently had someone suggest that renting a house in Tuscany would be a great vacation idea for my family. When I expressed hesitation over the cost he said, “Well it doesn’t have to be a *villa*”. I also recently had a conversation with someone about the book Nickeled and Dimed. He was saying how eye-opening it was, assuming that I had the same perspective, but I was really thinking that I didn’t need to read a book about being a housekeeper because I used to tag along with my mom when she cleaned houses and also occasionally cleaned hotel rooms when I was younger.

    1. YES. Second this. I haven’t been to Europe, and many people in my professional community find it horrifying. I haven’t been to Europe because, hey, I’ve never had money to go to Europe; however, people frequently indicate that they think this is because I’m closed-minded or because I don’t want to go experience the world. The number of times people have said, Oh, you simply HAVE to go to _____ (exotic foreign location) or you’re living a wasted life! or something similar is frustrating.

17. I think there’s a lot of intermingling on this thread of two very different concepts: money and (socioeconomic) class. You can grow up in a low income family that still has middle class traits. I grew up poor and with a lower SES background. I used to think about blue vs white collar and realized that my family was collarless. But I’m smart, as was my mother.

    Personally, I grew up with a alcoholic father usually out of a job (but blue-ish when he did work), a mother with high school diploma who worked clerical, and a family filled with ne’er-do-wells. In fact, I consider most of them the ‘undeserving poor’. Oh well. I make just barely into the 6 figures now (not law) but still feel ill at ease (I’m in my late 40s) at times. But with the travel perks of my job, I’ve traveled a lot so I feel like I can ‘pass’.

    I grew up in garage sale clothes, with an occasional trip to KMart for something new. My bit of advice is to engage a personal shopper at Nordstrom’s. Even if you need to stick to a strict budget it’s worth it to look good. Granted I’m not at the upper level in terms work fashion but I dress for the part.

    Acting/copying is a plus.

18. I don’t work in big law, but I find the underlying class issue resonates with me. I have chosen to work in the court system as opposed to working in a firm partly because of my poor upbringing. My interests are diverse and “cultured,” so I could easily manage to stay afloat in a firm. However, I have concerns about my ability to bring in clients and to help keep a firm viable over the long term.

    I also have had several situations where colleagues misinterpret or misunderstand a situation because they come from middle or upper class backgrounds. This is particularly true with the criminal cases I encounter. My background of growing up poor in a very unstable home with significant mental and s*xual abuse means that I view and respond to cases far differently on a personal, not professional, level. It also means that some cases are extraordinarily difficult for me to handle. Circumstances have led to me informing my boss of my experiences, and it was not until he knew some of the details that he began to comprehend how difficult some of my workload is for me. My boss has responded incredibly, and we have shifted some of the difficult matters to him until I am better able psychologically to handle them.

    My background can be a boon. I am better skilled at working with domestic violence victims, for example, than many people. I think that for me, my background has shaped the career choices I have made. And I think I am more authentic by acknowledging my past and using it to help my community than if I tried to wallpaper over it and pursue a traditional legal career.

19. Thanks for posting. The feelings the blogger posted are all ones I experience, not just in the legal field, but in all areas of life in general, having been raised below the poverty line. As I have grown older and wiser, I talk positive to myself to overcome those exact feelings. However, I still find myself trying to find the best bargain and only shop sales. Then I perpetuate the problem, because I am frustrated with the lack of cohesive style in my closet. It feels like I don’t even know where to begin to start with a wardrobe, style, look, that would boost my confidence. I watched a cute young thing get out of a convertible yesterday to come to a meeting in my office, and I thought, “Why can’t I do that?” Even after 20 years in the business, I am not comfortable being so “on top of it”. It is an ingrained pattern.

20. LOVE this guest post and the discussion that it’s sparking! As someone from a working class family, I find myself telling people all the time that one of the things that attracted me to law school is that it’s a blank slate- my grades were my grades no matter who my father was or what shoes I was wearing. (Now, succeeding in Big Law *after* you land the big job is another story entirely…)

    I think that law is a very popular profession for the children of blue collar workers because (to some extent) you can get by on your own wit and hard work rather than family connections. Needless to say, I’m not surprised to see a very diverse mix in the comments of those who completely relate to the post and those who don’t at all. It’s really interesting that there aren’t more resources out there for “first generation professionals,” because I’m sure there are a lot of us!

    1. Agreed! I find this all very interesting, both the post and the comments. I come from a more-or-less traditional middle class family with a lawyer and teacher for parents, but both of them were the first generation in their family to go to college (none of my grandparents finished high school) and we grew up in an area where the rate of professional careers and people with college educations was very low, so I had some very middle class traits and some very non-middle class traits. Early on in my education and work life, I was not consciously aware of that and how it was impacting my ability to identify or not with my fellow students and co-workers. I still find it a very interesting topic as I’m now in a relationship with someone who is the first college graduate in his family (he’s also a lawyer, as am I), and I work in a field where I encounter a mix of people but definitely more who are living below the poverty line and/or didn’t finish (or start) high school.

    2. I also really appreciate this guest post and all of the discussion. I come from an upper middle class background and have been fortunate in many aspects of my life to help get me to where I am today. I’m not in law or any field with a similar culture, and from the descriptions I read I think I would feel like a complete outsider walking into a Big Law office. This discussion is pretty eye opening, and I can only imagine how that environment must be so much more alien for someone with a less-privileged background.

    3. Thanks, Kat, for this guest post. This is the first time I’ve realized that some of my struggles in the workplace have been because of culture mismatch with my upper middle class colleagues. I am thinking about raising this with our diversity committee to pull together a reading list and discussions so that others in my cheap shoes can have better resources than I did.

21. This thread reminds of a comment someone made the other day about how a 1 carat diamond engagement ring is “modest.” That comment surprised me. I had never in the whole of my life seen a 1 carat diamond until I went to a top 3 law school where it seemed that pretty much no one in my class had a childhood like mine. It was MAJOR culture shock, and I was such an awkward goofball, and I’m surprised I got any job offers at all. I grew up in a totally dysfunctional family (with alcoholism, abuse, and minimal education) that fluctuated between poor and lower-middle-class (and back to poor again – see dysfunction). I am now 38 years old and still feel like a fish-out-of-water at times. It rankles me when commenters call out other commenters for being unenlightened re: social issues (like the STFUthiss!te people). Some of us just did not grow up in families who taught us these things (or taught us the opposite things), and we have to pick them up as we go. It’s not like anyone was born knowing how to navigate this world and race/culture/religion/sex issues. I think people forget what a privilege it is to learn those things as a child.

    1. Thanks for this posting! It describes me completely! I agree that many times, you just have to pick it up as you go along.

22. Great article! Yes, I grew up poor. My family was on welfare til I was 7. I won’t go through the things that come with being poor. Being poor and having the job I have now (I work in the federal government in DC) made me realize that I am just as good as everyone else there and I would say even better. Just because I didn’t grow up with a lot of money and material things doesn’t mean that I can’t be successful and that I am not smart. I do feel sometimes like I missed out on a lot of things my coworkers have done like traveling, taking vacations (I never took a vacation when I was a child. I tend to avoid these discussions. I had only been to three states (Ohio, WV, Penn which are all right near each other), by the time I was 18. I don’t let it affect my self-worth. However, I don’t discuss the poverty I grew up in. One girl I work with had the same background as me and is more willing to talk about it, so kudos to her. I think I have to work harder and do more things to show that I am just as capable as doing things as people who went to Ivy League schools did.

23. I grew up extremely poor, the kind of poor that most people don’t realize still exists in America. We had no running water, no indoor sanitation, and I only had a few changes of clothes at any given time. We had power sometimes, but that depended on whether we paid the electric bill. I would sneak parts of my “free” school breakfast and lunch home so my mom would have food. My mom could not read or write when I was growing up (she has since gone to an adult school, at my urging). I worked manual labor jobs (construction, house cleaning, painting, etc.) because they paid more than jobs like waitressing. The first time I went to a dentist and an eye doctor in my life was when I was in college.

    All of that being said, I really haven’t found the transition to biglaw that bad. It is so much easier than my former life. I sit in an air-conditioned office and work on a computer all day, and someone pays me a lot of money for that. And I get health insurance and loads of other benefits. Sometimes I work long hours, but it sure beats working on a construction crew in 100 degree heat. The people I work with are nice. I do work at a more quirky firm, so it really isn’t like an old boys club.

    That being said, I can be super cheap about things. It took me a long time to be OK with paying 30-40 dollars to go out to dinner (I live in an expensive city). I still pack my lunch most days, as I don’t want to pay for it. And I am really skilled at taking advantage of AmEx and frequent traveler programs to get a bunch of free stuff. I’ve started to buy nicer things for myself, realizing that Nine West is not a designer. ;)

    1. “All of that being said, I really haven’t found the transition to biglaw that bad. It is so much easier than my former life. I sit in an air-conditioned office and work on a computer all day, and someone pays me a lot of money for that.”

       THIS. Exactly this!

       I don’t work in biglaw (frankly, I’m not even sure if I should be “allowed” here haha, I work in creative corporate), but I didn’t find anything about college or working hard frankly, when I compared it to how I grew up and the struggles I saw my mom face working for minimum wage.

       I sit in an air conditioned office all day (I grew up in South Texas without heat or air conditioning in our shack), I get paid to design all day, if I get bored and hop on Reddit for a few minutes I’m not gonna get in trouble, if I’m 20 minutes late for work nobody’s watching a clock, if I need to take an extended lunch break to run an errand or get a haircut it’s no big deal. And if I’m not feeling great or have something else to attend to, I can usually work from home with no drama.

       I didn’t even find working for myself freelancing terribly difficult, I just felt secluded and didn’t like it so I returned to corporate.

       It’s shocking to me occasionally how easy my life is — and I’ve worked with some of the biggest brands in the world doing what I do, at a speed people would find exhausting, and I still think it’s nothing compared to the drama my mom had to go through.

24. I find this guest post very interesting. I work in finance. When I first started in my firm, I was from the state school (horror), a young woman, and the first in my family to go to college. I grew up what I would call lower middle class. My parents were divorced, and very young. My dad worked a blue collar job, and my mom was a waitress. I was worried that I would be “found out”. I did not have the class and family history everyone else around me seemed to have. Plus, every partner at my firm was male, over 50, and part of a religion I knew nothing about. It’s funny, because I think the “inferiority” I felt was a motivating factor in my success….I did want to prove to them I deserved to be there, and I did work harder than anybody else to do it. But, I did. I mean, I am one of them now (a partner). I am, in the end, pretty sure my background was a big part of why I was motivated to succeed. But I do recognize and own some of the behavior this has brought upon me. I always like the “best” of everything – because, let’s be honest, luxury brands are, well, luxurious. I am brand conscious, I need to drive a certain car, wear certain clothes – to maintain the image? To compensate? My husband, who was reared in an upper middle class family (and graduated from Stanford) does not feel the need to prove anything to anyone, is very secure in his background, and just has that confidence I still don’t….the things we carry with us from childhood are powerful.

25. OMG. I relate to this post SO MUCH! I’m not a lawyer, but I am transitioning to working in a very conservative field (accounting) and….yeah. I grew up in the poorest part of my lower-middle-class town and never even realized it until I was 18 or so.

    Okay, here’s an illustrative example, and you all are going to be SO GROSSED OUT but……. Until I moved out (which, in my defense, was at age 19), I did not know that one was supposed to wash one’s bed linens.

    Imagine my horror. I slept on the same bed, the same sheets, for my entire childhood, then a different set from 13-19, and neither of those sheet sets was ever washed.

    I do crazy, weird, unnecessary things to save money. I stretch my contacts out until they start to hurt my eyes unbearably. I wear $15 shoes from Wal-Mart.

    My husband comes from a conservative, upper-class family, and he and his family are slowly helping me change my ways, but my default is to spend next to nothing on myself and save every dime I can, even if it means being acutely uncomfortable or walking 2 extra miles or putting my health at risk (see: contact lens abuse). As I become aware of these behaviors and their roots, I can’t help but wonder how much they (the behaviors) have changed the path my life has taken. I’ve doubted myself so much, I’ve passed up on amazing opportunities.

    This post is really timely for me. For the past 2 months, I’ve had a new mantra: Say yes. I’m saying yes to everything (within reason of course) – plans with friends, study groups, career fairs (even if I feel like the least-qualified person there!), on-campus info sessions, joining social groups, coffee with people I’ve just met. I used to decline everything, because I felt unqualified, undeserving, unimportant. But *I* was the only one who felt that way about myself, and a lot of it goes back to my, well, my upbringing. (There were general family problems as well. Man, I’m really spilling my guts here!)

    Anyway — thank you for this post.

    1. It’s only been 3 months that I stopped stretching my contact lenses, and I have been a contacts wearer for 15 years.

26. The cultural shift is immense, there is no doubt of that. I grew up poor, as in we didn’t have indoor plumbing till I was 12, and there is just so many small things that you end up taking completely out of proportion because you lack all the gauges someone from a different background would have. For me at least, there is a LOT of anxiety in a variety of situations, despite the fact that it has been a while since I left all that behind. It comes up at the strangest of times and manifests in a lot of application of the phrase “Better stay silent and be thought a fool than speak up and remove all doubt” with the fact that my career is finally getting out of i9ts 5 year rut, it is becoming more and more evident. (I still balk at paying more than 20 quid for a pair of jeans)

    I am good at passing, though, because I have the added benefit of being foreign but not too foreign, with a side of having had a decent amount of fine arts cultural capital implanted to me by my (largely absent and narcissistic) father. Not to mention the fact that I have turned appearing to know more about things than I do into a fine art. (the key is a good memory for trivia and being able to deflect and make it seem that you know the subject but your interest lies elsewhere in a related field…)

27. Thanks to OP. I am a physician and in a leadership role in my workplace. I grew up with free school lunches and my mom proudly stating we never missed a meal, which in retrospect means we were close. She had multiple jobs including cleaning houses to help us get by. I still feel like I “pass” in many situations though I get more comfortable as the years go on. I still hate being in places like country clubs and I still think there are huge culture gaps that can become apparent in conversation. In college I used my background to shock peers from time to time; I rarely do that now but I do feel it’s a point of inner pride as well and I hope it will always inform my politics.

    1. Thanks for this post! My background is very similar. I agree that it is a sense of accomplishment when you realize that you beat the odds! Also, it does influence how I view societal issues and policies.

       1. That is my concern. It’s one thing when an individual is well-off. However, many corporate bosses and politicians are from well-off backgrounds and they make policies that affect people whose lives they do not understand.

28. This is a fascinating discussion.

    Someone upthread rightly pointed out that income does not equal social class, and someone else also made the very good point that having a class background that doesn’t match that of your coworkers or superiors is essentially an intercultural work environment. And in a way poverty is like pregnancy–you can talk about what it feels like and people can try to understand, but people who haven’t experienced it just don’t get it.

    Anyway, for others who, like me, feel their class-culture background hasn’t equipped them to work smoothly and confidently in a white-collar environment, try these two things:

    1) Take an acting class. Seriously. Learning how to mimic others’ behaviour and how to conceptualise and enact a specific role really helped me get into my groove.

    2) Take an anthropology research methods class, or just read a bunch of anthro textbooks. People before have suggested approaching family gatherings, etc as if you are an anthropologists studying a strange tribe. Do this with BigLaw too! Culture is not so mysterious. There are systematic ways to learn what a cultural group values, what the power structure is, how decisionmaking works, what its codes of etiquette are. Learn how to observe social groups, and treat BigLaw people as a kind of foreign tribe that you need to integrate with.

    When you work outside the social class-culture you grew up in, you are basically forced to be an actor-anthropologist, right? So learn the best practices for those roles.

29. I grew up middle class but with a very stingy father who grew up poor and kept pinching pennies.
    I am bright and considered to have high potential so got into the most expensive university in my country on a scholarship. When students would roll-in in BMWs I would walk. Note this is a country where BMW cost the same as buying 2 apartments and a minimum monthly wage is at $100.
    Everybody dressed in designer clothes when I wore thrifted clothes which had a distinctive smell from the product they spray on them to avoid moths.
    One of my biggest joys was when I secured a side job on campus and went to buy clothes. I had new clothes, with tags on. I was happy and felt rich.
    After college, I joined a top company. For some reason, I was in college once more. Surrounded by wealthy people who knew each other, who shared the same family names, vacation spots and hobbies.
    I remember my first week, I was on company retreat sitting with sales director and general manager at the hotel lobby and they said would you like to drink something and I timidly said: “I am not carrying any cash right now”. He was shocked and explained that I am sitting with senior manager so they always pay but I also learned that you can charge things to your room and don’t have to pay immediately. This was because it was my first time staying at a hotel.
    I have many anecdotes of not even buying a bottle of water because I thought it was wasteful and then getting a migraine because of dehydration.
    I read a lot and research lifestyle topics to constantly improve myself.
    I have come a long way, but every now and then I need to tell myself that it’s OK to have a good lunch when expensing it, it’s OK to take a first class seat on the train instead of travelling standing for 3 hours, etc.

    1. Thanks for sharing this! I also had the same experience, in that the first time I traveled on a plane or stayed in a hotel was in adulthood. So naturally, I was expected to know what to do, when in reality, I did a whole lot of research on how one would go about doing these things!

30. My family background is very ethnic and working class. I am the first generation to college and managed to go to law school and work in BigLaw. There are many things I have had to change about myself to fit in including accent, speech patterns, having appropriate reactions, etc. There are very few people in BigLaw that paid for their own school and came from background that was not comfortable and firmly middle class.

    This post expresses my experience perfectly. In fact, I can always tell someone like me. They have just a little more bravado and less real confidence. Being laden with money issues and working class values that do not often comport with life while wearing a white collar has been a huge hurdle to conquer. But, it can be done.

31. Thanks for this insightful post. I just wanted to say that I agree with you; growing up in a lower socio-economic class than others does impact how you interact, communicate, and develop relationships when you find yourself in a higher class in adulthood. I believe society has expectations for individuals to act or be a certain way based on the perceived socio-economic class they are in (which in turn could be based on where an individual lives, their work, their clothes, or who they associate with). Many times, you’re just expected to know, or to have the appropriate upbringing that allows you to know how to fulfill those expectations. But when you don’t have those experiences and cannot relate, it becomes awkward. . . quickly. . . . Case in point – I grew up dirt poor. My dad was a mechanic and my mom was a SAHM. . .both were not into popular culture and so I didn’t grow up with a sense of what was “cool/in” and what the best bands/songs/movies were. We didn’t travel, so I never experienced “going to the ocean” or what “boating/yachting” was all about. I didn’t eat fancy foods with fancy names, and certainly didn’t know that grapes, cheese, crackers, and wine would go well together, let alone the specific types of each that would make the best combination. Recently, my new manager (the company CFO) met with me and a few other colleagues, and in his attempt to “break the ice” he started talking about his favorite “cool” songs and movies of the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s, and started asking us about ours. Needless to say, it was an awkward moment when it was my turn. He switched gears to talk about golfing and his averages and proceeded to ask about whether any of us had traveled to this or that popular golf course, and how this particular one was better than the other one. During this meeting, the conversation steered from more travel experiences, to restaurants and different types of dishes, to alcoholic drinks, to professional sports games. Many individuals chimed in because they had that experience and upbringing and could relate. I chimed in as well as I could, but as I hopelessly sat there trying to remember the last time I did something similar or related to whatever the conversation topic was at any given time, it was just HARD because my experiences associated with this higher socio-economic class that I now find myself in, are very limited – none in childhood and very few in adulthood. As I sit here and type, I know that my childhood preferences have followed me into adulthood, but I wonder if they are also keeping me from exploring the opportunities that being in a higher socio-economic class an afford. For instance, I can easily afford to travel, but I’ve chosen not to. I’d prefer to save my money. I can easily afford the BMW or Mercedes, but I’ve chosen a Toyota. I’d prefer to save my money. Perhaps these tendencies were infused in me during childhood, perhaps they were picked up along the way. What I AM sure about is that my values and ethics (as shaped by my experiences) – hard work, grit, and determination, will define me as who I am today. As they say, “you grow and learn.”

32. This was such a great read! It’s so true about the discomfort and difficulty of getting over the hump (esp when it comes to purchases/behaviors). I hired a cleaning company for the first time this year for my home, and I kept it secret from everyone because I’m embarrassed about it. There’s no need for me to feel embarrassed, but it feels like such a luxury (it is!) that it makes me feel guilty. Whereas coworkers who have always lived in wealth have no emotional turmoil about these things. It’s things like that, that make the division very obvious.

33. I find this topic fascinating and love reading the commentary.

    So much of what is being discussed though is a very stereotypical perception of what “rich” is, and I personally feel like it is not entirely accurate. Perhaps it is an “Old-Money/East Coast” stereotype. Not all “rich” people enjoy yachting (is this even a thing beyond the East Coast?), not all rich people even go to college, let alone Ivy league schools. Many take over family businesses (old money), start their own businesses (new money) or just generally don’t go for other personal reasons. Believe it or not, many of the rich have no clue either what fork to use either because those types of formal dinners are few and far between and not how people eat daily.

    I am starting to wonder if the commenters think it is possible to be considered “rich” and not reside in or around NYC! I don’t think the wealthy living in Kentucky are eating crab cakes and taking that yacht out regularly…

    I am not saying there aren’t class differences between the rich and the poor that may make either feel out of place in the other’s circumstances. There are many differences and a lot also have to do with where you grew up (small town in the country, the south, east coast, midwest, west coast). All of these areas have different norms, which are compounded with class norms.

    I can really understand why so many have posted that they grew up middle class and still don’t relate to the things being discussed. It’s not because they are “devaluing” the experience of growing up in poverty, it’s because the way “rich” is being defined is very narrow and excludes most people.

    While Kat lead with these ideals and many of the commenters followed, the guest poster talks mostly about her attitude towards spending. From my experience with those I know, I don’t think your attitude towards spending is solely based on if you grew up wealthy or poor.

    Some of the biggest spenders I know grew up extremely (food /shelter insecurity) poor. It seems to have more to do with how you were taught or had to learn to manage whatever funds you did have. Many who grow up poor are taught to pinch every penny. Many others (the ones I know) came from families who got so sick of pinching whenever there was spare cash they celebrated and splurged while they had it. They learned when you had money, to spend it! This is very different from many friends I have who grew up learning that if you have extra money, you invest it.

34. I grew up fairly middle class (mostly bought clothes at garage sales/thrift stores rather than being able to afford new, always had food but restaurants of any kind were a special treat), though it felt lower in the reasonably affluent but not ritzy suburb where I lived. Since joining the professional workforce, I’ve definitely struggled with some of the things the guest poster mentioned. I do okay on the social front, having learned quickly what should and shouldn’t be discussed and how to phrase things so as not to draw attention to my ignorance. But on the clothing/appearance/keeping up with the Joneses front, I find it hard to figure out what I actually need to splurge on. If I ask my friends who grew up wealthy, they tell me that I “must have” things that I am pretty sure aren’t actually “must haves,” but I also know that I am probably going noticeably cheap on some things that ARE noticeable and important. For example, I probably don’t HAVE to have an $800 handbag or shoes, but how expensive do I need to go to not have those items stand out? I’d love to see a follow up post addressing these sorts of wardrobe concerns – it would be a great fit for the site!

35. I am very disappointed in the comments that are posted above. So many of you all have such an opinion about who should and should not be allowed to relate to this story. It doesn’t matter. There are always people who have had it worse than you and then there are those that have it better.

    Just to share my perspective & background:
    My father was forced by his father to quit middle school so that he could stay at home to help on the farm and take care of his siblings (my dad is 1 of 12 children and he was the first boy born after 4 girls). My mother graduated high school. We live in a very rural, poor community in the heart of the Appalachian Mountains. My dad is an injured coal miner (a huge rock feel on him underground and while he is well and able to work, his insurance company will not allow him to) and my mother is a janitor for a coal company’s office. As a child and teenager I never suffered as a result of our lack of financial resources. My parents pushed me to be my very best so I could go to college. We weren’t sure how we were going to afford it, but I was offered a full ride academic scholarship surprisingly. I was the first in my family to go to college, the first to graduate. From there, I somehow ended up as a pharmacy student at a very small rural school. I’m preparing to graduate in May and I am not adjusting well to the “lifestyle” that is expected from someone with money and a title (I will officially be a “Doctor” of Pharmacy). I always feel that I am out of place because socially I cannot relate to their lifestyle and I assume that they cannot relate to mine. I can most definitely relate to the story that is shared and I appreciate that I am not the only one that is experiencing this professional “shock”

36. Wow, I am so happy to see this post. I grew up poor (like not eating some days, wearing clothes donated by a church, in a dangerous neighborhood in the South Bronx kind of poor). I am now a salaried employee at a global corporation and I really feel uncomfortable around my “peers”. I have no idea how to relate to anyone. It got so bad, I jumped at taking the 3rd shift position just so I can avoid seeing people.

    I would love to learn how to deal with feeling so inadequate at work.

37. Thanks for this guest post. I could identify with some of her experiences and it made me think back to why I, too, may have done things a certain way. I have been an attorney for 25 years. I had some of the same experiences. I didn’t go into a big law office but rather have been a career prosecutor. Thanks again for the insight. Its always good to hear from others and their experiences.

38. I’m currently in law school and this guest post describes exactly what I am feeling.

    Looking back on my childhood, I’m fairly certain that we were poor, although because I lived in a very isolated area where many of the children at school were in similar or worse circumstances and because my parents did take measures to hide it from me, I did not realize it at the time. From what I recall, we always had really cheap and some handmade clothing, pretty much all meals were made at home, we certainly didn’t have cable/satellite, my mother would get extremely angry if I ever damaged anything in any way, even if it was just grass stains on clothes, and anything good we had, I found out later on, was liable to have come from a relative (ex. our computer). Things got better once I was in high school, I’m not sure exactly why, but I wouldn’t say that my parents will ever be well-off unless something drastically changes. Needless to say, my parents could not pay for my education, though I will say that I did receive some help from other relatives in terms of education expenses, not to say that my parents did not help at all, but they have less means.

    Anyway, now that I am in law school, I feel disoriented. I can’t relate to the other students at all – they all talk about cottages or vacation homes, sailing, vacations, parents who are professionals, etc. and I just can’t relate to that. Most of them are clearly just living off of their parents’ money (and throwing it away on expensive coffee, fast food, and other nonsense daily) and I find it really difficult to watch. I keep lying to everyone back home about making friends…they’d think I’m a loser if they knew that I couldn’t make any. It’s also difficult not being able to participate in many of the activities and opportunities – I know I will never be able be part of this program for the summer term for example. Everyone goes on and on about how it is a wonderful experience and how I should go (it is abroad, like an exchange), but I know it can never happen. I simply cannot afford to pay the extra tuition and living expenses.

    But the worst part is not knowing how to act, which I can see is going to get worse. Like when I go to a reception or other formal event. I don’t know how to dress or the protocol for my behaviour. I don’t understand what the food is either, most of it is completely unrecognizable to me and in most cases, I am too worried about not liking it to even try it. Everyone else just knows what to do and I don’t, so I can’t even ask without revealing my ineptness and looking weak – I have to try to fake it without actually doing anything that might be wrong and I don’t think I’m pulling it off very well.

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