From the creators of SparkNotes, something better. This, however, only lasts one day before she has a catastrophic shift at Jerry’s that night: George has been accused of stealing, she’s dealing with four highly demanding tables, and at one point Joy corners her to yell at her. Get Your Custom Essay on, By clicking “Write my paper”, you agree to our, By clicking Send Me The Sample you agree on the, Nickel and Dimed vs Scratched Beginnings: a Retorical Analysis, Review of "Nickel and Dimed" By Barbara Ehrenreich, Starving but Sarcastic: Ehrenreich’s Humor in Nickel and Dimed, https://graduateway.com/nickel-and-dimed-analysis/, Get your custom Instantly acclaimed for its insight, humor, and passion, this book is changing the way America perceives its working poor. It’s a hectic environment with a moody manager, Joy, and she only lasts two days holding down both jobs—she then has to quit the Hearthside, since Jerry’s pays more. ” Perhaps the reason is management viewed there Black and Hispanic workers as less educated and sophisticated, and therefore didn’t want them directly interacting with the hotel’s middle and upper class clientele. She speculates what it would be like to actually try to live on the minimum wage, and says that some enterprising journalist should try to do itnot thinking that the editor will say it should be her. Analysis. (including. Nickel and Dimed is a unique analysis being that the author uses herself as the “experimental guinea pig. Barbara Ehrenreich’s book, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, describes the experiences the author went through when she forfeited her good life and went undercover so as to see for herself how it feels to work for an hourly wage of $6 to $7. 2333 Words10 Pages. Barbara ends up moving into a Comfort Inn for $49.95 a night, a bit cheaper but still far from affordable, which means she’ll have to end her experiment early since she’ll never manage to equal income with expenses. Barbara is hoping to apply for hotel housekeeping jobs, since she remembers how tired waitressing made her as a teenager, and she figures she’s been “housekeeping” at home for years. She speculates what it would be like to actually try to live on the minimum wage, and says that some enterprising journalist should try to do it—not thinking that the editor will say it should be her. I think that the main belief that Barbara Ehrenreich tried to explore in Nickel and Dimed is that, if anyone is living in poverty, than they can work their way out if they would only get a job. I remember in class when Dave talked about giving out cell phones to the people at his shelter so that if they had a job interview, they wouldn’t have to put down the shelter’s telephone number. Grants and services were given to low-income and inner city schools and research was being put into how to deal with the social causes of delinquency and stop the emerging problems of youth gangs. ” People who belong to the upper and middle classes often don’t consider the fact that you can have a job yet still be living in poverty. She finally finds a decent-seeming trailer, though it’s a 45-minute commute on the highway from the city. She finally tries to stir up union feeling among her coworkers, though this is mainly a halfhearted effort that only has the effect of making her see how other employees are also struggling to survive on their Wal-Mart wages. What could it possibly be like then, for someone who can only afford a bag of Doritos for lunch, and doesn’t have the vitamins provided by fresh fruits and vegetables to help get them through the day? Retrieved from https://graduateway.com/nickel-and-dimed-analysis/, This is just a sample. An earlier … She uses the metaphors in Nickel and Dimed to help paint a vivid picture of the daily lives of the poor for her audience. At one hotel, she is sent over to work at the accompanying restaurant, which she calls the “Hearthside.” It’s a sad-looking place, ruled over by a red-faced, snarling cook named Billy. Irony. Looking at whether or not individuals living in poverty are considered to be a minority group by our contemporary culture is an interesting scenario. Nickel and Dimed effectively argues that low-wage jobs severely restrict the workers’ mobilities and that American society does not properly support the poor. As the tourist season ends, Barbara calculates that she won’t make it to the end of the month with her wages as they are, so she finds a second job at Jerry’s, a national fast-food chain. The protagonist’s encounters as well as that of the rest of her colleagues indicate that social mobility is locked out to many in … It seemed like these homeowners are just waiting for one of their priceless heirlooms to disappear. Individuals and Corporate Rhetoric. She’s sent off with a team to clean houses, which turns out to be highly aerobic work, especially since they’re only allotted a certain amount of time per house. She storms out—and her time in Key West ends. In modern day America, Homelessness, and the stereotypes associated with being homeless, is one of the larger problems social workers are working to help with. Barbara grew up in a relatively comfortable environment, but all the previous generations of her family were working-class miners, and poverty has been close enough to her that she clings gratefully to her comfortable, flexible writing job. D in biology and more financial stability than she exhibited in this book. 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