Over the past two years, we’ve been told to expect a silver lining to the housing crisis.  At a first glance, the release of tomorrow’s foreclosure numbers should add to that optimism, as analysts expect the number of new foreclosures to drop dramatically.  But does that mean we’ve truly passed the worst moments of the housing crisis?

All this week, we've talked about class on The Takeaway. And we gave you an assignment: take a photo of something in or around your house that indicates what class you're in. 

You sent us some great photos, which you can see after the jump — and we've asked photographer Karen Marshall to help curate them. Marshall is a documentary photographer. She's on the faculty at the International Center of Photography, where she is a seminar leader in the photojournalism documentary program.

It’s taken me a while to get around to writing this because, as the listener comments and pictures about the symbols of being (or not being) in the middle class have proliferated, I have thought more about how much of a big deal this was in my childhood back in the ancient 60s. As a little kid, I was constantly comparing myself with my neighbor kid pals to see who was ahead of whom in the inevitable pecking order of the American post-war economy.

As President Obama continues his conversations with Americans, with stops in Iowa and Virginia today, we wanted to take a moment and go global.  What do the growing middle classes in other countries look like, and what do they strive for? Today, we're focusing on India and China, two of the world's burgeoning societies. 

To help us look at both countries, we're joined by Vishakha Desai, president of Asia Society. We also talk with someone who's lived in the middle class in both China and India. Aadil Ebrahim recently moved from Hong Kong to Mumbai, where he works for an investment asset management firm.

More listeners weigh in on what being middle class means to them.

We've been talking about what signifies class to you. And we're collecting your photos.

Look around you. What objects or images represent economic class most to you (middle, working, upper)?

Is it income or material possessions? Is it the ability to have a parent raise their children as opposed to a nanny or daycare? Is it being a homeowner or owning your vehicle? Is it a state of mind? These are some of your answers to the question we posed yesterday: What signifies middle class to you?

For many years, an integral part of the American dream has involved making it to the middle class. We associate the phrase with steady, secure work, home ownership and providing for a comfortable — if not lavish — lifestyle for our family. But has middle class America fundamentally changed since the Great Recession hit? Do people that once saw themselves as solidly middle class see themselves differently now?

Here are responses we got by text:

No debt!
—Nashville, Tenn.

Well, the neighborhood is known as middle class, and even though we don't have the nicest cars and the best lawnmower we can still afford for our three kids have Mom at home. We struggle with bills and don't eat the best foods but our kids aren't out causing trouble because their parents are raising them not a sitter or themselves.
—Salt Lake City, Utah

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This morning, Takeaway listeners and Facebook followers told stories about what it means to be part of America's middle class and how that's changing. Now, we're looking at the middle class outside America. John Hockenberry wrote a blog post about the connection to Europe's working class and how it evolved over here. But what is the emerging middle class like in countries such as India and China? As this group grows rapidly in these countries, what problems are they facing?

And we're asking you: If you've been to China or India recently — or you're from there — what is your sense of the middle class there? How does it compare to America's?

America invented the middle class. Europe invented the working class. The differences explain practically everything about why politics in America barely resembles politics and parties across the Atlantic.

The industrial revolutions in Europe took place against a background of the aristocratic traditions of class, rank, and royalty.  The growing wealth of the working classes produced a constituency allied against the upper ranks. The working class did not wish to be merely included in some political food-chain along with the aristocracy: It competed with the vestiges of royalty for political power. Aristocratic politics were expressed in the language of the Tories. The working classes were the Labor party or the socialists and communists.

I used to think we were middle class, but after being laid off, I feel more like we've fallen through the cracks. We, the working-, nonworking-, and barely working-poor are pawns, but have no real value to the politicians - after all, we don't have enough to donate to the war chests. — Lyndon Drees (via Facebook)

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Media powerhouse Arianna Huffington thinks we're looking at the death of the American middle class.  She argues that point in her new book "Third World America: How Our Politicians Are Abandoning the Middle Class and Betraying the American Dream."

When Piper Kerman graduated from Smith College she veered away from the typical middle class lifestyle and chose, for a time, to go a different way. She fell in with a group of charismatic drug smugglers and ended up traveling to fine resorts around the world to help traffic drug money.