nickel and dimed review

I just finished Nickel and Dimed. The book is about a journalist’s sojourn into the working class. For me, it was a reminder that I am not working class. I have college degrees, networks (as small as they may be sometimes), a support system, some money saved up, a car, and a plethora of other variables. The book is a must read for anyone that doesn’t have to live in motel day-by-day or a small apartment on weekly rent.

The book was written ten years ago and you can already tell that it is outdated. There are no 9/11 experiences. When Barbara Ehrenreich wrote this book there was a labor shortage. And of course she was not dealing with a recession. Housing prices have skyrocketed since she wrote the book and I presume rent has as well. There is one other thing that has changed. Universal health care is now trying to make its way into law.

At the end of the book, Ehrenreich talks about how the poor have no longer been discovered, but just the opposite forgotten. And now people no longer feel that the poor are there because they are lazy, drug addicts, and thieves. She states that “disapproval and condescension no longer apply” and that guilt doesn’t go far enough, but it is shame in ourselves that kicks in when we think of the poor.

I don’t think shame is the right emotion here. I think she gives people far too much credit, and I think she wants people instead to feel shame. Just as with slavery, people’s minds were changed: from condescension, to guilt, to shame. Those same steps still need to be taken today for continuing class and racial barriers. Ehrenreich does not give enough credit to the social system in place of the individualistic capitalist society we live in. We still live in a society that says the individual is the key to their own success and there are no systems in place to keep people poor.

Maybe the most constructive aspect of the book is that Ehrenreich shows that even a highly successful women with a Ph.D. can’t really “make it” when she is left in the same predicament as the working poor. Ehrenreich really proves that there needs to be some changes with affordable rent, cost of food, salaries, and healthcare. Until then the rich will continue to ride on the backs of the poor. Whether they feel condescending, guilty, or shameful is up to them.