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

Ehrenreich describes her “scientific” approach and explains why she felt compelled to set her experiment’s parameters as she did. She recounts her many hesitations about the social experiment and how to approach it with journalistic integrity. She also notes the visible and invisible advantages she has over many of her coworkers: she is a white woman who speaks English, and she does not have to care for children. Race, gender, and language are constant factors of the experiences Ehrenreich has in these jobs, and the lives of her coworkers and their economic status are irrevocably affected by these factors. In addition, Ehrenreich comments that she is in good health due to a lifetime of access to high-quality healthcare, a good diet, and a healthy lifestyle, all privileges that she is aware are not available to people living in poverty.

She describes her family’s history by including autobiographical details which serve to dispel doubts readers might have about her intentions as a college-educated, middle-class white woman entering the world of low-wage labor, which is, in most places in the US, dominated by people of color without her education level. As a college student in the 1960s, Ehrenreich was skeptical of a trend where college students took up working-class jobs after Marxist revolutionaries romanticized the working class. She calls them “blue-collar wannabes” (2). Ehrenreich alludes to this historical trend from the 1960s counterculture movement to disassociate her own experiment with such naivete, and she clarifies that her deliberate social experiment should not be taken for an instance of poverty tourism. She acknowledges that not only is it impossible to reproduce the true subjective experience of poverty, it is an undesirable experience, remarking, “I’ve had enough unchosen encounters with poverty in my lifetime to know it’s not a place you would want to visit for touristic purposes; it just smells too much like fear” (6). Here, Ehrenreich reminds the reader that true poverty is not something that anyone would willingly choose.

Ehrenreich describes her family’s background, stating that her family was not wealthy. These personal details create more trust with her audience, as Ehrenreich explains that poverty is not a completely foreign concept to her: her father worked his way up from the copper mines, eventually becoming an executive at Gillette, and her sister worked low-paying jobs such as factory worker and receptionist. By describing her personal relationship to poverty and acknowledging that her father’s success ensured her own privilege, she recognizes the divide between herself and most low-wage workers. Ehrenreich also seeks to show that she is not presumptuous, and she does not believe that she is the definitive expert on poverty.

To provide the audience with a deeper understanding of her credentials and how she is qualified to do this experiment, Ehrenreich recounts her educational background. She pursued a PhD in Biology and then became a journalist. She views her profession as a writer as both a privilege and a duty to her family members, and she underlines the fact that she is incredibly privileged to even be able to conduct such a social experiment.

In addition to personal history and background, Ehrenreich peppers the chapter with statistics that highlight the necessity of exploring the lives of the impoverished in greater depth. She cites a statistic from the Economic Policy Institute that in 1998, “30% of the workforce toils for $8 an hour or less” (3). She emphasizes that poverty is not a result of laziness, but rather economic and social conditions that make it incredibly difficult for people to save money or find better opportunities. By conducting this investigation, she brings a personal perspective on facets of society that are rendered invisible or only presented as statistics.

To show her transparency and honesty and build trust with the reader, she admits that she bends the first rule slightly several times throughout the experiment. For instance, during an interview for a waitressing job in Key West, Florida, she mentions that she can greet European tourists in their native languages, an example of her breaking the rule of using skills acquired from her college education, since she learned these languages at university. In Minneapolis, she does not take the best-paying job offered to her when she chooses to work for Wal-Mart instead of Menards. She also admits that toward the end of the experiment, she begins to rant at Wal-Mart, bringing up grievances to her coworkers and trying to inspire them to unionize, rather than staying neutral.

She also describes her feelings of guilt over the deceptive nature of the experiment and the laptop that she carries everywhere with her to take notes, which symbolizes the true nature of her purpose. The fact that Ehrenreich lies to her coworkers and bosses might give one pause. However, she also states that the deception was not as deep as she or readers might believe, as she did do the jobs and try her best at them. She realizes, later in the project, that perhaps the pretense was not as false as she led herself to believe, as she was not pretending to be a waitress or housecleaner, but simply doing the job.