Book Review: An Analysis of Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed

This report offers a comprehensive review of Barbara Ehrenreich's book, "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America." The book explores the realities of low-wage work and the struggles of the working poor in the United States. Ehrenreich, a journalist and social critic, undertakes an investigative approach, concealing her identity to experience firsthand the challenges faced by low-wage earners. The review identifies the central theme of disguised poverty, where full-time workers struggle to meet basic needs due to insufficient wages. The report highlights the book's strengths, such as its use of real-life reflections and investigative journalism, and also addresses its weaknesses, including limited statistical evidence and a lack of detailed policy recommendations. The review concludes that the book effectively depicts the harsh realities of low-wage America, emphasizing the need for a living wage and government intervention to address disguised poverty and promote socioeconomic development.

Running Head: BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Name of the Student
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Author Note

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Introduction
The book “Nikel and Dimed: On (not) getting by in America”depicts the real picture
of the poor or unskilled labor force of America surviving poverty-level wages. The book is
considered as one of the best works of the author Barbara Ehrenreich. The author describes
herself as a journalist, political activist, social critic. She is also a receiver of Lannan Literary
Award. In this book the author tried to find out the low wage earners in America who are not
considered as poor, are struggling to meet the basic necessities of life (Ehrenreich 2010). In
order to achieve her purpose successfully the author tried to gain a real-life experience of
being a low-wage earner by concealing her original identity(Ehrenreich 2010). This book is
enriched with the valuable experiences, observations as well as conclusions derived from the
experiment. The purpose of this essay is to find out the central theme, strengths as well as
weakness of the book and also provide a review of author’s writing style and justice to the
theme.
Purpose or Theme
The purpose or theme of the author is vivid from the initial chapters. According to
Krumer (2015) first few chaptersgave logical evidences about the distress of full-time
workers and talked about the baselessness of the myth “Any job equals a better life”.In the
next chapters she elaborated the experience she gathered by staying in three different cities,
earning $300 per week, making provision for cheapest lodgingduring the three months of her
experiment (Ehrenreich 2010).The following chapters revealed her observations. In her
attempt to survive on a low wage she found thatlow-salaried jobs demand tireless hard work
and exhaust people mentally and physically. Even after this tremendous hard work, people
earn wages, which are not sufficient to afford food and transportation or pay rents
(Ehrenreich 2010). They have to depend on at least two jobs to get the basic amenities of life.

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In the final chapters she focused on the ignorance of the US government towards the low
wage earners and raised questions regarding the reasons behind such a low wage rateand
explained the adverse effect of disguised poverty to the economy of America.Finally she
introduced the concept of “living wage rate” rather than a “minimum wage rate” and
provided recommendations to implement it (Ehrenreich 2010).
Evidences from the book to support the theme
In order to support the theme of disguised poverty the author have employed the
method of investigative journalism (Ehrenreich 2010). Sometimes she worked as a waitress,
sometimes as a nursing home worker, a hotel maid, house cleaner, Wal-Mart salesperson
without letting anyone know her real name and occupation. Her real-time observations
revealed that there were no job security or health policies for low-wage earners. Also, the
salary she received was$ 7 per hourwhich could not even fulfill the basic needs and like all
other poor people she had to consider health coverage a luxury (Ehrenreich 2010). She
supported the book with current data and her own reflections.
Strength
One of the major strengths of the book is the use of real reflections derived through
investigative journalism. This had not only made the book engrossing but also enriched it
with valuable as well as unknown facts. According to Grusky(2018) strength of the book is
the citation of the logical argument to educate the mass that America is not free from poverty
rather there exist people who are very poor in spite of having jobs. According to Lemke
(2016) the book has effectively used few statistical instruments and raised voice against the
false assumptions by the government that all the employed people are capable of achieving a
good standard of living. This is one of the major strengths of this book. A few suggestions
provided to fight with disguised poverty can also be counted as a strength of this book.

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According to Johns (2018) the author followed a style of writing which is descriptive as well
as logical and capable of influencing the readers. Hence the vivid and poignant language is
also a strength of the book.
Weaknesses
The book has a few weaknesses. Slevin (2018) argues that there are chances that the
author looked at the poor through the eyes of an independent and aristocrat woman and made
reflections staying at her own comfort level. This may make the analysis incorrect. This may
be considered as one of the weaknesses of the book. The book contains very few statistical
evidences. This is another weakness of the book. Falola (2017) argues that, in the concluding
chapter the author suggested a realistic wage rate but did not suggest any framework of salary
structure. It demanded for the active participation of the government to eradicate disguised
poverty but gave a little focus on the recommendation part. Power (2017) argued that the
book did not mention how the private organizations have extended their helping hands
towards the disguisedly impoverish people. Other authors consider all these, asthe major
drawbacks of this book.
Conclusion
Finally, it can be concluded that the author is successful to depict the image of “low-
wage America” all through the book. The author has put a lot of effort to live the life of a
poor wage earner and find out the truth. With the help of real-life experiences, logical
evidences the author has been able to generate a mass appeal so that her message reaches to
the US government. The author herself is a political activist and aims to encourage people to
engage in social welfare activities at the end of the book. The author has focused on the ill
effects of disguised poverty on sustainable development of America, but has not suggested
any measurements, which the government should take to ensure a healthy living-standards to

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the poor and move America a step ahead in its course of maintaining sustainable development
(Ehrenreich 2010). The book could have been made more appealing to the readers, if the
author would have included the interviews of people who are deceived of the basic amenities
of life even after being employed (Ehrenreich 2010). Again, more statistical methods could
have been employed to make the analysis scientific. Moreover, the book should suggest an
effective framework for public programs by the US government, in the favor of disguisedly
impoverish people so that the condition of the poor wage earners can be improved and socio-
economic development of America can be accelerated.

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References
Ehrenreich, B., 2010. Nickel and dimed: On (not) getting by in America. Metropolitan Books.

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Bibliography
Falola, J.A., 2017. THE POOR WE HAVE WITH US ALWAYS.
Grusky, D., 2018. The inequality reader: Contemporary and foundational readings in race,
class, and gender. Routledge.
Johns Jr, D., 2018. Drama, Low Wages, Fugitives, and Eviction: A Qualitative Analysis of
the American Underclass as Presented in Books and Trash TV.
Krumer-Nevo, M., 2015. Poverty-aware social work: A paradigm for social work practice
with people in poverty. British Journal of Social Work, 46(6), pp.1793-1808.
Laird, J., Parolin, Z., Waldfogel, J. and Wimer, C., 2018. Poor State, Rich State:
Understanding the Variability of Poverty Rates across US States. Sociological Science, 5,
pp.628-652.
Lemke, S., 2016. The Documentary: Barbara Ehrenreich’s Nickel and Dimed and David
Shipler’s The Working Poor. In Inequality, Poverty and Precarity in Contemporary American
Culture (pp. 61-84). Palgrave Macmillan, New York.
Power, E., 2017. Hunger and Poverty. Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies.
Slevin, J., 2018. Indictment of US poverty. Guardian (Sydney), (1826), p.8.