In 1999 and 2000, Ehrenreich worked as a waitress in Key West, Fla., as a cleaning woman and a nursing home aide in Portland, Maine, and in a Wal-Mart in Minneapolis, Minn. She first finds out that meeting her rent is a lot more difficult then she thought. As a waitress in Florida, she struggles each month to reach her rent of $675. As rental prices go up in America, people’s wages do not. They struggle, working 7 days a week, most working more than one job, just to meet rent cost. In all three jobs she sees many examples of how the common person struggles each day. She describes full-time workers who sleep in their cars because they cannot afford housing and employees who yearn for the ability to "take a

The “working poor” in this book are not just characters portrayed by an author. They are real people. I personally have worked in many places similar to the ones discussed in this book. At Eckerd, we were constantly looked upon by cameras and lost prevention people. You are not treated as a person; you are treated as someone who is very untrustworthy. Drug test that are talked about in this novel are very routine. It seems like that if a person is not stealing or using drugs, there is something abnormal about them. The rich bosses look down upon these employees like they are indigenous slaves. These jobs help put food on the table for the families of these hard working people. They put clothing on a child’s back. They work hard long hours for very little pay or respect. The work conditions are very poor also. Although required by law, some places do not even have common things such as a bathroom, or sink to wash your hands. This is a life that thousand of people live each day. It is not a life that is chosen, but it is one that has to be accepted.

Although financial problems are a major problem for people in this low-income/working class, psychological problems are also there. Stress and depression are very common. These employees work hard long shifts, which take a toll on a person’s body, not just physically but mentally. At her one job in a Wal-Mart Ehrenreich describes how it feels like the employees are under the repressive surveillance of men and women whose job it is to monitor her behavior for signs of sloth, theft, drug abuse, or worse. She even gets to experience the humiliation of the urine test. Pressures like these are

Some topics in this essay:
American Society, Minneapolis Minn, Wal-Mart Ehrenreich, United America, Department Labor, American Culture, West Fla, clothes food, Nickel Dimed, help food, people world, people america, hard little, people countries, nickel dimed, world poor, physically mentally,