Comment The problem with the analysis (Score 4, Insightful) 183
The problem with the analysis (according to the article I read -- didn't read the formal analysis) is that using income as a measure of class misses the high variance of goods in the US. For instance, the article mentions that the median price of a home is about $500k. This likely isn't enough to buy a studio apartment in lower Manhattan. So, a more accurate measure would be a dimensional analysis that uses income as a ratio with respect to what a median priced basket of goods (eg, a house, average grocery bill, etc) in various parts of the US.
In other words, it would give a normalized unit measurement of how much, say, earning $130k in Des Moines, Iowa differs from making the same amount living in Cambridge, MA. Then, "upper middle class" would, I assume, be a measure of a standard distribution on a normal distribution (eg, the top 1/3 of the distribution).