working class

See synonyms for: working classworking classesworkingclass on Thesaurus.com

noun
  1. those persons working for wages, especially in manual labor.

  2. the social or economic class composed of these workers.

Origin of working class

1
First recorded in 1805–15

Other words from working class

  • working-class, adjective

Words Nearby working class

Other definitions for working-class (2 of 2)

working-class
[ wur-king-klas ]

adjective
  1. of, relating to, or characteristic of the working class, the class of wage earners or manual laborers: He came from a working-class neighborhood in Nova Scotia, where his mother took in laundry and his father had a job in the coal mine.

Origin of working-class

2
First recorded in 1830–40

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use working class in a sentence

British Dictionary definitions for working class

working class

noun
  1. Also called: proletariat the social stratum, usually of low status, that consists of those who earn wages, esp as manual workers: Compare lower class, middle class, upper class

adjectiveworking-class
  1. of, relating to, or characteristic of the working class

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Cultural definitions for working class

working class

In the United States, the population of blue-collar workers, particularly skilled and semiskilled laborers, who differ in values, but not necessarily in income, from the middle class. In Marxism, this term refers to propertyless factory workers.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.