Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
...and 2000 Ehrenreich worked in Florida, Maine, and Minnesota, accepting work as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing home aide and Wal-Mart sales associate; however, throughout the novel she changed the names of her co-workers and locations of where she worked. She had the advantage of a degree, health insurance, good health, a car and money to aide her in her first months rent; however, she was still required to work two jobs, seven days a week in order to supply herself with the basic needs to survive. Given these circumstances, Ehrenreich’s experience isn’t even really worst case scenario. Imagine, what would happen if Ehrenreich had to support a family on the same income she had to support herself. What would happen if she didn’t have health insurance and became ill, or injured at work? Early in Ehrenreich’s experiment she realized that she could not survive in the world of the working poor with only one job. Even working two jobs, she barely had the money for her food and housing. Housing was especially difficult to find. Ehrenreich looked everywhere from motels to trailer parks, most all being out of her price range. I never once stopped to think that people may live the majority of their life actually living in an old, run down motel that I wouldn’t even think to stay at for just one night. It is a real eye opener to step back and look how I have took different necessities in my life for granted. The main difficulty Ehrenreich comes across in her search for an affordable apartment is, most apartments require a security deposit and first and last months rent up front. “So I take the $500 deposit I have coming from my landlord, the $400 I have earned toward the nest month’s rent, plus the $200 reserved for emergencies, and use the $1,100 to pay the rent and deposit…” Luckily for Ehrenreich she has this money in advance; most people don’t even have that. Ehrenreich points out that no matter how hard an employee works it may not be a solution to avoid a life of poverty. While serving as a waitress in Florida Ehrenreich states, “I was raised by the absurd Booker T. Washingtonian precept that says: If you’re going to do something, do it well…Do it better than anyone has ever done it before.” Ehrenreich found the jobs both men...