Living on a tight budget for a while is about as close as many upper-class people get to being poor. This, of course, is nothing like actually living in poverty. About 25 years ago now, as the Clinton-era “welfare-to-work” push was underway, writer Barbara Ehrenreich wrote Nickel and Dimed, in which she (as a woman of means) went “undercover” to experience what it’s like to actually live on minimum wage in America. She lived in three different areas (Florida, Maine, and Minnesota), experiencing several different kinds of jobs: waitressing, hotel housekeeping, maid service cleaning, working at a nursing home, and retail at Walmart. She gives herself a couple thousand dollars to start with and to cover any true emergencies, and then gets to it.

In what should not have been but seems to be a surprise, being poor is really hard. There’s no getting ahead. There’s barely even keeping her head above water. Being on your feet all day is physically exhausting and trying to figure out whether she can make her body get through a second job or if she can afford not to is a constant struggle. Housing absorbs nearly all of her income, and it’s a constant struggle to find something cheap enough that she can afford, but close enough to work to not drain her resources (her Rent-A-Wreck car and gasoline, not to mention time) excessively. At her price range, these apartments often lack full kitchens, so fast and packaged foods are her only real options. She can’t absorb the cost of unscheduled time off, so feeling like she might be getting sick just means pushing through.

There has been a lot of criticism of this book over the years, some of it very valid and other parts of it less so. Ehrenreich admits to some unattractive and classist beliefs as she begins her experiment, like that her education (she holds a Ph.D.) and other markers of her status will somehow be recognized, that it will be obvious that she doesn’t really belong among the working poor…which of course never happens. And it’s hard to believe she’s as surprised as she claims to be at how difficult getting by on minimum wage actually is, but her whole life experience has worked to shelter her from that knowledge. Generally, I found that she acknowledged the privileges she brought with her, like the ability to have any sort of savings and a lifetime of straightforward access to health care. Her interest in and concern for her coworkers seems genuine, if a bit shallow because she doesn’t stay any one place long enough to form strong bonds.

Reading this in 2019, ultimately, meant that the initial shock and/or surprise about the insights that it offers aren’t really to be had anymore. The issues she highlights (the difficulty of putting together a security deposit while living paycheck-to-paycheck, workplace injuries covered up by shady employers, the inane “personality tests” that are often required for retail work) are long since old news to anyone paying even cursory attention. This isn’t a bad place to start, if you are a person who has never been poor wanting information about what poverty might be like to experience. But if you’ve already got a firm grasp on the basics of why life below the poverty line might be challenging, you won’t find anything new or paradigm-changing here. ( )

Still applicable today although written 20 years ago ( )

Fascinating account of what those who are in manual labor positions experience. Barbara Ehrenreich goes undercover to report on what these workers endure.
She gets hired as a maid, a cleaner, a waitress, and an employee at Walmart. She exposes the inequality and treatment, the pay discrepancies, the terrible living conditions, the stringent guidelines (long hours, very short lunch breaks, low pay). I was appalled at the Merry Maids cleaning policies, and saddened by the treatment these workers endure.
A must read! ( )

Momentous...

I actually was curious to try it myself. And then i spot this one.

A must read.

4.5 stars

Overall, I really liked this book and think that it could enlighten many middle- and upper-class individuals. Many people think that those in poverty simply need to "get a job" and while that may be true on the surface some of the time, the issues of poverty go much deeper. Ehrenreich explores what it's like for those living on minimum wage - people who are not too lazy or too good to work, yet who still are barely surviving.

"I grew up hearing over and over, to the point of tedium, that 'hard work' was the secret of success: 'Work hard and you'll get ahead' or 'It's hard work that got us where we are.' No one ever said that you could work hard - harder even than you ever thought possible - and still find yourself sinking ever deeper into poverty and debt." (p. 220)

"When someone works for less pay than she can live on - when for example, she goes hungry so that 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. 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.... To be a member of the working poor is to be an anonymous donor, a nameless benefactor, to everyone else." (p. 221)

Granted, the book has its problems:

Ehrenreich isn't actually poor - she's an upper-class PhD, in fact, and so to write this book, she goes "undercover" working as a waitress, maid, Walmart sales clerk, etc. She makes a lot of decisions that many true poor people wouldn't make (particularly when it comes to spending her money), but of course, somewhere there probably is a poor person as dumb as she is when it comes to not understanding that Goodwill is going to be the best place for a cheap belt required for your work uniform.

She is an atheist, and makes some rather negative comments about Christians, lumping all Christians into one category of hypocrites.

She's very pro-marijuana and spends a bit too much time lamenting drug tests in the workplace.

There's also a fair amount of language in the book. Language when quoting someone else I can understand, but I don't think profanity is the best way to prove you're a professional.

But overall, this is one of those books where you take the good and roll your eyes at the bad while you move on. I would definitely recommend it! ( )