Nickel & Dimed: On Not Getting By In America - by Barbara Ehrenreich

This book got to me, but probably not in the way that it got to most people. It annoyed me! I grew up poor, I've worked many of the jobs that she sampled and survived. My family has worked and still works many of those jobs and yet we got by. Yes, there were difficulties but the attitude I was taught was that if you want to get somewhere you work your way there. Sometimes you suffer for various reasons, but you work to get what you need.

I felt like Barbara set herself up for failure going into this experiment. She set such rigid criteria for what she would allow herself or not allow herself that she precluded failure before she ever began. She also gave herself enough advantages that she never really saw the truth of the experience.

There were jobs she would not do, yet she said she would take the highest paying job offered to her. When you are struggling, there are not jobs that you will not do. There are no jobs that are beneath you or that you avoid because they are too boring or too intensive. You take the highest paying job you can get and you are willing to do anything.

She made sure that she always had a car. A car is a luxury to many poor people, who rely on rides from friends or public transportation. Cars add expenses. You have to pay for gas, insurance and to fix the damn thing when it breaks (and it will break). As I child I remember going through a pretty fair number of cars and thinking back I realize that that had a lot to do with my mother not having enough money to do regular maintenance on a car. So, cars didn't last and had to be replaced with another cheap car that also wouldn't last long because it was already old and probably would not be maintained very well.

She goes into each situation with enough money for a down-payment on an place to live (if she can find one she can afford). As she quickly learns a place of your own is a luxury for the poor, especially someone who is single. We lived with my grandparents for several years. At one point it was the three of us (myself, my mother and my brother), my grandparents, my aunt, and my mom's brother along with his 4 sons all in the same house. We lived there while we waited for an opening in government assisted housing. Because she was only in each situation for one month, she never saw what can be accomplished. You can't accomplish much in one month. You win through perseverance and patience, not by changing your circumstances every 30 days. Starting over takes a lot and the more you have to do it, the harder it is.

She does admit in her final chapter that she made many mistakes, including her choice to work at Wal-mart over taking another (possibly higher paying job). She passed on the other job because basically she didn't want to get up and go to work 2 days in a row (after working late the night before). That's part of life.

Yes, it's hard and yes she went from being a physically and mentally healthy woman to being tired and hurt. The difference? She came from a background where she was not used to having to do those types of jobs. She was used to doing what I am doing right now - sitting behind a desk and writing. If I had to go out right now and do the work I did for many years, standing on my feet all day. I, too, would hurt at the end of the day; and I'm much younger than she is/was. But, in time you do get used to it, and when it's all you've done you don't even notice it.

I worked my way up from the lowest wage jobs and taught myself new skills that I was able to use to make money. My husband went the harder route. He also grew up in a poor household with a single mother. He worked his way through college. He never took out a student loan. He worked restaurants and retail and sometimes two jobs at once while he went to school full time. Eventually, he graduated with a degree in Accounting, but he didn't stop there. He continued to work full time at his Accounting jobs while continuing his education to obtain his CPA and his Master's Degree.

Do I feel sorry for the people she describes in her book? To some degree. But, mostly I don't think that she ever really got it. They don't want us to feel sorry for them. They don't need it. That is their life and they are used to it. If they want more they can make it happen, but it is up to them. It does no good to hand it to someone, which seems to be what she wants to do.