Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America By Barbra Ehrenreich Lisa, Izabella, Kari.

Nickel and Dimed:On (Not) Getting By in America By Barbra Ehrenreich

Lisa, Izabella, Kari

Book Criticism

The book Nickel and Dimed “is about the struggles of those who toil in low wage dead-end jobs. Its message is that it’s almost impossible to succeedby remaining in jobs that require longhours at low pay without finding a wayout of that trap” (Monitor staff).

The parents of a Bedford High School student complained that Nickel and Dimed “portrayed capitalism negatively and was offensive to Christians” (Monitor Staff).

Book Criticism

A woman from the Cannonball Read series heard many people, “praising Nickel and Dimed -- both in conversations about the books, and in conversations about homelessness, housing access and poverty”. When she read the book, she said, “so many people praised it because it revealed to them the realities of the working poor. Ehrenreich is actually forthright about the fact that her experience does not mimic what it is actually like to live in poverty—it merely shows the difficulty of living from day-to-day on low wages” (Cannonball Read series).

In contrast, Michael Reksulak thinks that this book is mainly about, “education.” He believes that “every college student learns that if America was to increase the minimum wage in Economics 101 there would be quite a few difficulties.”

Author Biases

Personal: Family worked hard to get themselves a higher income

Educational: Has a PhD in Biology. Went to Reed College and Rockefeller University.

Religious: Atheist Racial: WhiteGender: Female

Author Biases

Professional: WriterGeographical: Moved around a lot as a child

and adult.Political: Democratic Socialist

Summary: Introduction

1. She cannot fall back on any skills derived from her education or usual work 2. She has to take the highest-paying job she is offered and do her best to keep it 3. She has to take the cheapest accommodations she can find, with a reasonable consideration for safety and privacy.

Summary: Continued

Ehrenreich also adds a list of thing she will endure.

1. She will always have a car 2. She will never allow herself to be homeless 3. She will never go hungry.

Summary: Serving in Florida

Key West, Florida. Minimum wage processEhrenreich works as a waitress

at Hearthside. Ehrenreich obtains another

waitressing job at a restaurant called, Jerry’s.

Next she attempts to work for a full day with two jobs and gets another job at a hotel.

She then leaves Key West in search of a new place.

Summary: Scrubbing in Maine

Ehrenreich moves to Portland, Maine.She chooses it for its “whiteness”.Wants to make a living by working two different

jobs and to finally get to move out of the Motel 6 she found herself living in when she moved.

“I need a job and an apartment, but to get a job I need an address and a phone number and to get an apartment it helps to have evidence of stable employment. The only plan I can come up with is to do everything at once and hope that the teenagers at the Motel 6 switchboard can be trusted to serve as my answering machine.” (54).

Summary: Continued

After a job search, she eventually gets a job at a nursing home for $7 an hour and a job at The Maids for $6.65 an hour.

On the weekends she works at the nursing home and Monday through Friday at The Maids. She finds that it is a lot more work than she originally expected.

In the end she tells coworkers and the people that she was around that she was seeing if she could survive in low-wage jobs.

Summary: Selling in Minnesota

Ehrenreich moves to Minneapolis, Minnesota

Stays at rundown motel for $35 a night

Finds a job position at Walmart Must take drug testWorks in Ladies Department for

$7 an hour

Summary: Continued

Cannot afford much other than her rent

Motel raises rent to $55 a nightMoves to the Comfort Inn- costs

$50 a night.Plants the idea of a union in

co-workers headsQuits job at Walmart

Summary: Evaluation

There are “few or no rewards for heroic performances”(Ehrenreich 195).

Every job was physically demandingOverall, as a worker, a B+Rise of rents is outstripping the rise in payEmployers resist wage raisesMost surprising was the extent to which one

is required to surrender basic liberties and self respect.

Low wage workers have few options

Summary: Continued

Prosperous rarely see the poor and realize what they go through

Believes that we should be ashamed at our own dependency on the underpaid labor of others

“When someone works for less pay than she can live on-when she goes hungry so you can eat more cheaply and conveniently-then she has made a great sacrifice for you, she has made you a gift of some part of her abilities, her health, and her life” (221).

Central Claims: Introduction

In Nickel and Dimed, Ehrenreich believes that a person cannot live off of minimum wage without government assistance, Medicaid, and housing.

“But if the question was whether a single mother leaving welfare could survive without government assistance in the form of food stamps, Medicaid, and housing and child care subsidies, the answer was well known before I ever left the comforts of home” (3).

Central Claims: Continued

“According to the National Coalition for the homeless, in 1998-the year I started this project-it took, on average nationwide, an hourly wage of $8.89 to afford a one-bedroom apartment, and the Preamble Center for Public Policy was estimating that the odds against a typical welfare recipient’s landing a job at such a “living wage” were about 97 to 1” (3).

Central Claims: Serving in Florida

It is impossible to live on your own with minimum wage.

“Gail is sharing a room in a well-known downtown flophouse for $250 a week. Her roommate, a male friend, has begun hitting on her, driving her nuts, but the rent would be impossible alone” (25).

Central Claims: Continued

Managers have easy jobs.“Managers can-sit for hours at a time if they

want-but it’s their job to see that no one else does, even when there’s nothing to do, and this is why, for servers, slow times can be as exhausting as rushes” (22).

Central Claims: Scrubbing in Maine

Ads don’t always speak the truth.“A help-wanted ad may not mean that any help

is wanted just now” (60).

Central Claims: Continued

The poor people of America are “invisible” “The poor have disappeared from the culture at large” (117-118).

Central Claims: Selling in Minnesota

Low wage workforce changes people“How Barb turned out-she’s meaner and slyer

than I am, more cherishing of grudges, and not quite as smart as I’d hoped” (169).

Too much money is spent on drug testing“In 1990, the federal government spent $11.7

million to test 29,000 federal employees. Since only 153 tested positive, the cost of detecting a single drug user was $77,000”

(128).

Central Claims: Continued

It isn’t possible tomake a living while working at Walmart

“I either need to find a husband, like Melissa,or a second job, like some of my othercoworkers” (170).

Central Claims: Evaluation

People can’t support themselves with a minimum wage job

“Something is wrong, very wrong, when a single person in good health, a person who in addition possesses a working car, can barely support herself by the sweat of her brow. You don’t need a degree in economics to see that wages are too low and rents too high” (199).

Central Claims: Continued

You surrender basic rights to your low-wage job“What surprised and offended me the most about the

low-wage workplace was the extent to which one is required to surrender one’s basic civil rights and self-respect” (208).

The working poor make a great sacrifice“The ‘working poor,’ as they are approvingly termed,

are in fact the major philanthropists of our society. They neglect their own children so that the children of others will be cared for; they live in substandard housing so that other homes will be shiny and perfect; they endure privation so that inflation will be low and stock prices high.” (221).

Agreements

We agreed with almost all of the central claims- A person cannot live off of minimum wage without

government assistance, Medicaid, and housing.- It is impossible to live on your own with minimum

wage.- The poor people of America are “invisible”- Ads don’t always speak the truth.- Low wage workforce changes people- Too much money is spent on drug testing - It isn’t possible to make a living while working at

Walmart- People can’t support themselves with a low-wage

job

Disagreements

We disagreed with one central claim- Managers have easy jobs

Reflection

Introduction: explains Ehrenreich’s background and her middle class status.

-Claims based off of prior knowledge of the working class

Serving in Florida: Ehrenreich is trying to adjust to the low-wage work life

-Claims based off of initial strugglesScrubbing in Maine: Starts to connect more with

coworkers-Claims focused on struggles that are deeper rooted

Reflection: Continued

Selling in Minnesota: Ehrenreich heavily focuses on the unequal way of life the lower class goes through

-Claims focus on the way things should be changed

Evaluation: States the major points she came across, largest being that you cannot live off of a low wage job without assistance.

-Claims bring together major points of the book

Reflection: Continued

Ehrenreich builds up to her major central claims by first exposing what a working class life entails and then slowly bringing out her opinions against low-wage life and finally coming to the conclusion that a change is necessary

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Works Cited

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The End!