Mark Pryor: Middle Class May Include Those Making Up To $200,000

Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR) said Tuesday in a U.S. Senate debate that when he thinks of the “middle class” in Arkansas, he thinks of people who could make up to $200,000.

“Well, you know, under the law there’s a lot of different definitions of middle class. But when I think of the middle class, I think of most of Arkansas. Maybe that goes up to $150,000, $200,000. I mean, there’s different ways to judge it,” he said.

From there Pryor launched into remarks about his desire to protect the middle class, and attacked Republican Tom Cotton as a candidate who’s only interested in protecting the very wealthy. “Whereas Congressman Cotton seems to want to build the economy from billionaires down, I want to build it from the middle class out,” he said.

Republican operatives clipped it and circulated a portion of his comments.

Cotton attacked Pryor for the comment moments later.

“Senator Pryor must be the one hanging out with out-of-state billionaires if he thinks $200,000 in Arkansas is the middle class. When I think about a typical household in Arkansas — makes is $40,000 a year,” he said. “Unfortunately that’s down by almost 5 percent over the last six years because of the Obama-Pryor economy.”

Economists disagree on a precise definition of the middle class, but a typical U.S. household made about $51,017 per year in 2012, according to Census Bureau statistics released last year. Average Americans typically define middle class as one earning $100,000 or less, according to one poll.