Book: Nickel and Dimed On Not Getting By in America
Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Pages: 256
This is my 208th read for the year
What Amazon Says:
Millions of Americans work full time, year round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that a job - and job - can be the ticket to a better life. But how does anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich left her home, took the cheapest lodgings she could find, and accepted whatever jobs she was offered. Moving from Florida to Main to Minnesota, she worked as a waitress, a hotel maid, a cleaningwoman, a nursing-home aide, and a Wal-Mart sales clerk. She lived in trailer parks and crimbling residential motels. Very quickly, she discovered that no job is truly "unskilled", that even the lowliest occupations require exhausting mental and muscular effort. She also learned that one job is not enough; you need at least 2 if you intend to live indoors. This book reveals low-rent America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity - a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival. Read it for the smoldering clarity of Ehrenreich's perspective and for a rare view of how "prosperity" looks from the bottom.
This was an interesting book. It is part of the Rory Gilmore reading challenge, so that is what drew me to it. It was published in 2001, but of course it is still relevant today. While the minimum wage and sort of crept up a bit, the cost of living has skyrocketed, so I can imagine how much more a squeeze living day to day would be for a large part of Americans. The author left her comfortable living to spend some time with people who were trying to get by on minimum wage and who were forced to take even 3 jobs just to keep a roof over their heads. And not even then was it sometimes possible. It was eye opening and a good read and I encourage you to check it out.
Stars: 4
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