ETYM French.
The French middle class, particularly such as are concerned in, or dependent on, trade.
(French) The middle classes. The French word originally meant “the freemen of a borough”. It came to mean the whole class above the workers and peasants, and below the nobility. “Bourgeoisie” (and “bourgeois”) has also acquired a contemptuous sense, implying commonplace, philistine respectability. By socialists it is applied to the whole propertied class, as distinct from the proletariat. + prikaži više

The social class between the lower and upper classes; SYN. bourgeoisie.
Those members of society who earn their living by nonmanual labor. Their income is usually higher than that of the working class in recognition of greater skills. The subdivisions upper middle class and lower middle class refer respectively to the more skilled professions (doctors, lawyers, and so on) and white-collar workers (lower management, shopkeepers, and so on).
Karl Marx used the term bourgeoisie to refer to the capitalist class who do not live by the sale of their labor. + prikaži više