How did the class system in the Elizabethan Age work????

Question

I need to know how the class system worked and what type of citizens fit into each category

Answer 1

The nobility was at the top and contained the landed gentry, the dukes and earls and of course the family of the monarch. They only represented about 3-5% of the population.

During Elizabethan times there was a growing middle class or artisans, small land holders and merchant traders. They were at times people of wealth, but they were still never in the nobility, because of birth. Wealth didn't matter. They represented only about 10-15% of the population.

The bottom 80% were peasants and those who worked at the bottom of the wage scale. These were the poor who could just barely get by.