Nickel and Dimed

[coffeesnob318]

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich

I’ve been meaning to read this book for a while, but I’ve been putting it off because, unless it’s about coffee/coffee trade, I usually have a hard time getting through nonfiction books about serious things unless they’re funny. Good news! Ehrenreich is funny.

This book is the result of her experiences trying to earn a livable wage, working as your average uneducated, unskilled (a word she later recanted, stating that there is no such thing as an unskilled job) worker. I like several things about this book. First of all, she admits upfront and frequently throughout the book that she is far from average – she is white and speaks English and has her cushion of her "real life" at home to fall back on. She readily admits that, although she is committed to this experiment, she inevitably comes from a place of privilege, which is something that, sadly, so many people who have tried to do similar things have completely missed.

The second thing I like is that she respects the people she worked with. She kept them anonymous to safeguard their privacy. She didn’t act like she was more intelligent than they were (well, most of the time – she had her moments) just because she makes more money or has more schooling, even though she is honest enough to admit that that was her expectation going into it. I think this was somewhat of a humbling experience for her, even though she didn’t seem to get that it is ok (and at times supremely necessary) to accept the kindnesses of others.

What I don’t get is her apparent inability to budget. In one place, for example, she was earning a little over $1000 a month, yet she spent over $500 on food alone. !!! That might be a clue as to why she had a hard time making rent. You can’t do that. I spend about $75 on food per month, including eating out, and I eat pretty well. I have never in my adult life, regardless of how much I was making, spent $500 in just one month on food alone. She could have whittled that expense way down. In fact, in a pinch, a two loaves of bread and a large jar of peanut butter can feed you for a week. Although she was committed to trying to make her meager ends meet, she doesn’t seem to have a mindset conducive to doing so.

The thing that struck me most (probably because it resonated with my experience as well) is how much more generous poor people are than people who actually have extra to give away. There was a waitress she worked with who routinely paid for one customer’s meal out of her own tips because she knew he couldn’t afford it. There were kind neighbors who recognized her concern for her living conditions who did whatever they could to make her more comfortable, even though they were living in the same place.

She went to a tent revival because it sounded "like the perfect entertainment for an atheist out on her own" (tee hee). And she observed – after mentioning that she wished they had mentioned the Sermon on the Mount - "But Jesus makes his appearance here only as a corpse; the living man, the wine-guzzling vagrant and precocious socialist, is never once mentioned, nor anything he ever had to say." I love that quote, but it makes me sad. It is my wish that one day the world will not have to choose between Jesus and his followers.

A nice by-product of reading this book (I don’t think it’s just the season) is an overwhelming sense of thankfulness. I enjoyed it a lot.

Comments

[gradeafan.livejournal.com]

Good rec....yeah I'd be right there with you on that about spending $500 on groceries....I only get to that much in the food column if I include say maybe eating out with drinks at least twice a week. I honestly don't know if it would be that much if I ate in restaurants every single day.

g

[rhiannonhero.livejournal.com]

There was a waitress she worked with who routinely paid for one customer’s meal out of her own tips because she knew he couldn’t afford it.

Beautiful.