Nickel and Dimed

In Nickel and Dimed, by Barbara Ehrenreich, the author takes on the challenge of attempting to see what it is like to live in the United States on minimum wage. She works at a hotel that she calls the “Hearthside” as a waitress in the attached “family restaurant.” Ehrenreich is disgruntled by the manager and even goes so far as to say, “Managers can sit…but it’s their job to see that no one else ever does.” She usually has six tables she works at a time, sometimes more. Ehrenreich worries about being, “overqualified.” At first she seems to have the perception that just because you have some sort of degree, low paid jobs will be easier for the employee. Thus she learns the valuable lesson that this is not entirely true. She especially gets this shock at The Maids and Wal-Mart. When she finishes at the Maids she is surprised that she passed the physically daunting work. Ehrenreich often complains of said work to require much bending and lifting. Even describing the pools of sweat that runs down her back while she works. At The Maids she meets many women who are entirely devoted to their job. One girl, Holly, hurts her ankle one day and continues to work. The women seem to work hard and can barely make ends meet. Some even take pride in passing the Accutrac test they are given to see if they qualify. At Wal-Mart Ehrenreich works in ladie’s wear. There she organizes and puts away clothes. However, she ends up working eight to nine hours per day. Not an easy task no matter what job you are doing. In her “Evaluation” of her experiences, Ehrenreich seems to think that those that are not earning a minimum wage salary seem to simply ignore the plight of the poor. She feels that more should be done ease their grief by perhaps making living arrangements easier or raising wages even more.
Reader’s Guide Q. # 15Do you think Americans make excessive demands on the family unit rater than calling for the government to help those in need? Absolutely not. I think Americans have less of a tendency for asking for help from family in comparison to some cultures. This seems to be imposed most by the thoughts of living in an independent country in an independent way. I think people should be helping their families first without consulting the government until things get truly unbearable. Family should be the first line of defense. I think Ehrenreich doesn’t seem to realize that there will always be a lower class that does jobs no one wants to do. Trying to get rid of this class is what the Russians tried to do and that didn’t really work out for them.