Southern California Area Codes Are Status Symbols

It is amazing the lengths - no matter how trivial - to which people will go to define themselves and others on the basis of money. In Southern California, no status symbol is more telling than the all-knowing area code.

While clothes and cars may prove a person's taste (or lack thereof) or politics for certain topics, it is the area code that shows where a person resides, where a person is from. And after all, it's where a person makes their home that makes most of us decide whether that person is poor, rich, middle class, Republican, etc. The list can go on. After all, you can dress in the latest fashions or drive a huge Cadillac Escalade and still live in a lower-income area.

In Southern California, people from the 818 are from the valley. People from the 310 are usually considered to be wealthy. Then there is the 626 which is somewhere down the middle. This is just in Los Angeles County alone. The same stereotypes and stigmas stand in Orange County where the 909 is considered hickville (Riverside County).

And while all of these stereotypes may seem trivial and childish to most adults and really something only teenagers do to create more class distinctions between themselves and other teenagers, the area code status symbol is used by more than just children.

We all know the area codes as a label has far greater reach than just middle school kids. We know this because every time the Public Utilities Commission decides to create a new area code, people tend to get in a huff. They complain that this will cause mass confusion. They complain that splitting one area code zone into two, makes it such a hassle to call someone within the same area code. Whatever the reason for the complaint, it comes down to personal politics. We define ourselves by a three-figure number - and that's just sad to say the least.

In Orange County, the Public Utilities Commission announced not too long ago that the 714 zone would need to be split in two area codes because they were running out of 714 phone numbers. Thus, cities in Northern and Central Orange County would get the 657 area code and everyone would have to dial a "1" and then the area code before dialing a phone number in the formerly singular 714 area code zone. A big rush of criticism over the overlay ensued as people complained about the hassle when in reality most of the complainers just didn't want to be part of this new 657 area.

What would this new 657 say about the people in Fullerton, Orange, Santa Ana, Yorba Linda and Huntington Beach. Would other people think those cities are not part of the original "OC?" Would some sort of lesser-than stigma befall people living in those cities?

Who knows? It seems so petty a discussion to have. Those in Los Angeles County know this all too well. There are only 61 prefixes left in the 818, and by the end of 2009, the Commission said there won't be anymore available. Likewise, just last August, an overlay was created in the 310 splitting some people in Beverly Hills to some indescript 424 area code.

However, nothing can be done about any of this considering we all seem to be eating up the ability to have as many personal phone numbers in wireless and land line format as possible. And maybe that sort of waste is more telling than our obsession to define ourselves by a number.