OTTAWA — Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau admitted Tuesday he's not middle-class, but declined again to define it in terms of an income range.

"No, I'm not," Trudeau said. "I've always been very lucky."

Trudeau acknowledged the "very significant legacy" he inherited from his father pays healthy dividends, but he insisted his priority is still to make life better for the middle class — a group he defines in general terms.

"People who live off their incomes are the middle class, and those who live off their assets, their portfolios, their trust funds are not," Trudeau said Tuesday, declining for a second day to give the term an income range.

The Conservatives mocked Trudeau for a definition of middle-class they say would exclude anyone depending on assets during retirement, such as people who cash in their RRSPs.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Trudeau doesn't understand that "bank presidents are not members of the middle class and retirees living on their savings are members of the middle class."

Tory MP Phil McColeman also took a shot at Trudeau's personal wealth.

"Unfortunately, the Liberal leader has no idea what it is like to be middle-class," McColeman said. "Middle-class families do not live spoiled lifestyles while collecting thousands in speaking fees on the backs of charities."

Liberals, meanwhile, can't seem to agree amongst themselves on how to define the middle class.

Toronto MP Chrystia Freeland, often billed as a middle-class advocate, refused to take questions on the topic, briskly walking away from reporters without saying a word Tuesday.

Freeland's colleague, Scott Brison, was vague in his definition.

"You can't simply use earnings as a means to define it," said Brison. "There are different definitions of middle-class."

Kingston, Ont., MP Ted Hsu said he knows who is upper-class.

"I think if you can live off capital from a very young age and you don't have to work to build up that capital, you're probably not in the middle class," Hsu said.

Former finance minister Ralph Goodale said Canada's range of middle-class incomes is no mystery to him.

"The official statistics from the Department of Finance usually cover a range from about $40,000 to about $125,000," Goodale said. "It varies on circumstances a bit, but that's the range that the department has categorized as middle income."

Asked whether he's disappointed Trudeau couldn't come up with that answer, Goodale said his leader "expressed it in terms of other qualities and values."

Grit MP Judy Sgro's definition of the middle class spans wide range.

"Probably middle-class is somewhere I think ... probably between $30,000 and $140,000," she said.

MPs' basic annual salary is just shy of $164,000, but Sgro said she's still not sure if that would leave them outside the middle class.

"By the time they take the taxes off, it's hard to say," she said.

Brison acknowledged that he and his colleagues are better off than many other Canadians.

"We can delude ourselves into believing that our lifestyles and our incomes are normal, but we live quite well compared to an awful lot of Canadian families," he said.