work·ing-class
ˈwər-kiŋ-ˈklas 
: of, relating to, deriving from, or suitable to the class of wage earners
working-class virtues
a working-class family
: the class of people who work for wages usually at manual labor
Examples of working-class in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
Kadish Morris, New York Times, 10 Apr. 2024
In the working-class neighborhood of East Palo Alto, before Silicon Valley’s rise, my grandparents epitomized an era when jobs offered long-term security.
—Ebony Flake, Essence, 8 Apr. 2024
Yet Rizzo told me that dumping is rampant in working-class, outer-borough neighborhoods, where residents have long felt overlooked by the Department of Sanitation, and that many people have welcomed the surveillance cameras in the hope of getting relief from all the junk.
—Eric Lach, The New Yorker, 8 Apr. 2024
The neighborhood is home to a variety of Victorian and Queen Anne-style houses; sycamore, palm and walnut trees — and previously, well-to-do and working-class residents.
—Hanh Truong, Sacramento Bee, 6 Apr. 2024
The working-class dish has become a staple at legendary restaurants like Schwartz’s, Snowdon, Lester’s, Reuben’s and Smoke Meat Pete (where Gopnik-Lewinski got his training).
—Linda Zavoral, The Mercury News, 4 Apr. 2024
Colman is Edith Swan, a middle-aged church lady who still lives with her blunderbuss of a father (Timothy Spall) and mild-mannered mother (Gemma Jones) in a working-class neighborhood of Littlehampton.
—Ty Burr, Washington Post, 4 Apr. 2024
The result, by the early 2000s, was that 79% of the original white, working-class New Deal counties had peeled away from the coalition.
—TIME, 2 Apr. 2024
Even so, the bond would generate significant new dollars Miami-Dade could use for loans or grants to housing developers awaiting funding to launch projects aimed at low-income and working-class renters.
—Douglas Hanks, Miami Herald, 29 Mar. 2024
Ron Elving, NPR, 23 Mar. 2024
Throughout his time in power, Thaksin was hugely popular with Thailand’s rural and working class but his policies were anathema to the rich elites and conservatives who accused him of being a dangerous and corrupt populist.
—Kocha Olarn, CNN, 17 Feb. 2024
The state also became increasingly hard to afford, creating a wider gap between the new class of Silicon Valley tech barons and the huge, largely Black and Latino working class.
—Noah Bierman, Los Angeles Times, 27 Mar. 2024
Great industrial innovations of the past sometimes threatened the jobs of America’s working class: Remember those stories about robots replacing workers on the assembly line?
—USA TODAY, 7 Mar. 2024
In France, as in many Western democracies today, the working class is now in large part nonwhite.
—Elisabeth Zerofsky, New York Times, 6 Mar. 2024
The debutante and her husband, Robert Garrett, built the properties up into lavish palaces, hosting both Baltimore’s elite and working class at the Garrett-Jacobs Mansion on West Mount Vernon Place during the Gilded Age’s social season.
—Dan Belson, Baltimore Sun, 16 Jan. 2024
Had his images instead been slotted into a lineage of photojournalistic documentation of the British working class, like the work of, say, Chris Killip, the story might have been different.
—Chris Wiley, The New Yorker, 29 Feb. 2024
The flat cap was originally favored by the American and European working classes in the early 20th century, including the young paperboys it was named for.
—Hannah Jackson, Vogue, 29 Feb. 2024
Adjective
Image Gallagher was born in Providence, R. I., in 1965 to a working-class family.
—Kadish Morris, New York Times, 10 Apr. 2024
In the working-class neighborhood of East Palo Alto, before Silicon Valley’s rise, my grandparents epitomized an era when jobs offered long-term security.
—Ebony Flake, Essence, 8 Apr. 2024
Yet Rizzo told me that dumping is rampant in working-class, outer-borough neighborhoods, where residents have long felt overlooked by the Department of Sanitation, and that many people have welcomed the surveillance cameras in the hope of getting relief from all the junk.
—Eric Lach, The New Yorker, 8 Apr. 2024
The neighborhood is home to a variety of Victorian and Queen Anne-style houses; sycamore, palm and walnut trees — and previously, well-to-do and working-class residents.
—Hanh Truong, Sacramento Bee, 6 Apr. 2024
The working-class dish has become a staple at legendary restaurants like Schwartz’s, Snowdon, Lester’s, Reuben’s and Smoke Meat Pete (where Gopnik-Lewinski got his training).
—Linda Zavoral, The Mercury News, 4 Apr. 2024
Colman is Edith Swan, a middle-aged church lady who still lives with her blunderbuss of a father (Timothy Spall) and mild-mannered mother (Gemma Jones) in a working-class neighborhood of Littlehampton.
—Ty Burr, Washington Post, 4 Apr. 2024
The result, by the early 2000s, was that 79% of the original white, working-class New Deal counties had peeled away from the coalition.
—TIME, 2 Apr. 2024
Even so, the bond would generate significant new dollars Miami-Dade could use for loans or grants to housing developers awaiting funding to launch projects aimed at low-income and working-class renters.
—Douglas Hanks, Miami Herald, 29 Mar. 2024
Noun
The emerging dominance of those with college degrees has changed the mix of social attitudes in what was once the blue-collar party, leading candidates who want to win primaries to take policy positions more popular on campus than among the rural or urban working class.
—Ron Elving, NPR, 23 Mar. 2024
Throughout his time in power, Thaksin was hugely popular with Thailand’s rural and working class but his policies were anathema to the rich elites and conservatives who accused him of being a dangerous and corrupt populist.
—Kocha Olarn, CNN, 17 Feb. 2024
The state also became increasingly hard to afford, creating a wider gap between the new class of Silicon Valley tech barons and the huge, largely Black and Latino working class.
—Noah Bierman, Los Angeles Times, 27 Mar. 2024
Great industrial innovations of the past sometimes threatened the jobs of America’s working class: Remember those stories about robots replacing workers on the assembly line?
—USA TODAY, 7 Mar. 2024
In France, as in many Western democracies today, the working class is now in large part nonwhite.
—Elisabeth Zerofsky, New York Times, 6 Mar. 2024
The debutante and her husband, Robert Garrett, built the properties up into lavish palaces, hosting both Baltimore’s elite and working class at the Garrett-Jacobs Mansion on West Mount Vernon Place during the Gilded Age’s social season.
—Dan Belson, Baltimore Sun, 16 Jan. 2024
Had his images instead been slotted into a lineage of photojournalistic documentation of the British working class, like the work of, say, Chris Killip, the story might have been different.
—Chris Wiley, The New Yorker, 29 Feb. 2024
The flat cap was originally favored by the American and European working classes in the early 20th century, including the young paperboys it was named for.
—Hannah Jackson, Vogue, 29 Feb. 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'working-class.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Dictionary Entries Near working-class
Cite this Entry
“Working-class.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/working-class. Accessed 19 Apr. 2024.
Copy CitationLove words? Need even more definitions?
Merriam-Webster unabridged
Share