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Summary Of Nickel And Dimed

Decent Essays

The book, “Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America,” by Barbara Ehrenreich talks about the real-life experiences of a well-known American writer and journalist who is Barbara herself. To get the real-life conditions of an unskilled worker in the America, Barbara disguises herself as one of them in the form of a “divorced homemaker reentering the workforce after many years” (Ehrenreich 10). Her interest is on the issue of poverty being triggered by various questions as for how the unskilled survive on such wages, and particularly, if “the roughly four million women about to be booted into the labor market by welfare reform going to make it on $6 or $7 an hour?” (Ehrenreich 8). Barbara went on to works as unskilled labor various cities; …show more content…

The most important aspect is the lengthy, involving and exhaustive procedure followed during interviews of the applicants. Barbara describes, in one of her interviews, how the environment was intimidating, especially with the kinds of questions that are asked; such as if one had childcare problems if the management was responsible for their safety if they are honest people, and if they could turn in stealing employees. The most worrying of all questions was “How many dollars' worth of stolen goods have I purchased in the last year?” (Ehrenreich 14). These there followed drug tests that were sometimes humiliating because one’s privacy did not matter in front a health worker; one had to feel the cup with urine in front of the health worker (Ehrenreich 14). Indeed, this case shows how difficult it is to get a job because these recruitment procedures may kick out some …show more content…

The first weakness is that Barbara seems to uphold that class is one of the major contributors to the conditions of the working poor, but she contradicts this stand in some part of the book. For instance, she says, “I still think we could have done something, she and me, if I could have afforded to work at Walmart a little longer” (Ehrenreich 105). One may argue that this is because she wanted to get out the poor working conditions and never planned to come back and help the lady, an idea that the middle and upper class highly uphold. Another weakness is that Barbara, despite knowing the importance of unions, even to some point criticizing Walmart for lack of it and the fact that her father belonged to one, she does not want to be involved in union creations; “you don't want to come across as someone who might initiate something like a union organizing drive” (Ehrenreich 72). Indeed, this is a contradictory statement made the author appear as not living up to what she

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