Review Of Serving Americ Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel And Dimed
Serving America: Two Tales of Survival Franklin D. Roosevelt famously said, “No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in the country.” (1933, Statement on National Industrial Recovery Act). More than eighty years later, the idea of a “living wage” is still a politically decisive issue—an issue that many Americans feel needs to be addressed. In her 2001 bestseller, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America, Barbara Ehrenreich asks the question, “How does anyone live on the wages available to the unskilled?” (1). Ehrenreich, a successful journalist with a Ph.D. in Biology, concludes the only way to uncover the truth is to dive in to the low-wage workforce herself, …show more content…
As a waitress at the Hearthside in Key West, she cites the constant surveillance by management, “whose job it was to monitor my behavior for signs of sloth, theft, drug abuse or worse” (22). In addition, managers are allowed to sit down and relax, whereas servers are expected to utilize their downtime appropriately by completing tedious tasks. As Ehrenreich states, “You start dragging out each little chore, because if the manager on duty catches you in an idle moment he will give you something far nastier to do” (22). She learns this the hard way when she is assigned to vacuum the entire floor on her knees with a broken vacuum, a chore Ehrenreich finds demeaning and physically exhausting …show more content…
The tray carrying, for example, reignites an old back injury. Adding to her pain and stress of the job is Jerry’s’ lack of a break policy. Ehrenreich’s job is “to move orders from tables to kitchen and then trays from kitchen to tables”, only sitting to pee (35). Despite being physically active and in good health, Ehrenreich is a woman in her 50s and her agility is tested on her final night at Jerry’s. Describing it as “the perfect storm” (46), all of her tables fill up at once with demanding customers. Ehrenreich makes every attempt to satisfy the hungry crowd, but quickly reaches her breaking
A Brief Review Of Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel And Dimed
110 Words | 1 PagesI just finished Barbara Ehrenreich’s book Nickel and Dimed and it really heartwarming to read. Cleverly Subtitle “ How (Not) To Get By In America,” The book is about Ehrenreich’s “adventures” in survival as a member of the low- wage workforce that serves our meals, cleans our homes, and cares for our elderly. The book divvied into three sections, each of which find’s Ehrenreich in a new location, looking for new work and a place to live. , she took the job as a waitress at one restaurant before moving to a busier one attached to hotel. But exhaustion (and accompanying pain) got to her
Ehrenreich's Nickel And Dimed
449 Words | 2 Pages“When Melissa is getting ready to leave work at six, I tell her I’m quitting, possibly the next day. Well then, she thinks she’ll be going too, because she doesn’t want to work here without me”(Ehrenreich 189). Throughout my reading of this book, I have notice that I could connect to various points the author is trying to portray. When I first read this passage is made me feel nostalgic to when I used to work in the hotel. The hotel work has terrible, but my co-workers were amazing.
Review Of Jarrett Krosoczka's Speech Why Lunch Ladies Are Heroes
837 Words | 4 PagesIn July of 2014, Jarrett Krosoczka gave a highly persuasive speech about an unusual topic: lunch ladies. This speech, titled “Why Lunch Ladies are Heroes,” uses tales if why lunch ladies going beyond just cooking food to change the audience of sophisticated people for the better. He also teaches how a person can change the life of a lunch lady. Lunch ladies are not thanked enough, and he is speaking out to change that. Krosoczka is greatly influential in the topic of lunch ladies and uses strong emotional stories and crafty informal language to change people.
Analysis Of Nickel And Dimed On (Not) Getting By In America
736 Words | 3 PagesNickel and Dimed On (Not) Getting By in America, is the factual narrative of Barbara Ehrenreich’s venture to completely immerse herself in the life of a minimum wage worker. Through her experiment Ehrenreich set out to prove that the average worker can’t “make it on $6 or $7 an hour (1)” in this country; and with her hands on research, she defends while simultaneously proving that the reason so many people are stuck in the lower end of the economy is not because they are lazy or unskilled, but because the jobs they can acquire rarely pay enough to surpass the annual poverty levels. Ehrenreich's use of statistics, examples and the general tone she phrases her rhetorical questions with enlightens her audience of just how hard it is to get by
Similarities Between 30 Days And Serving In Florida
607 Words | 3 PagesMinimum wage is a topic that controls many individual’s lives in today’s society. Many individuals believe minimum wage should be raised to help families get out of poverty. In the documentary, 30 Days, two individuals set out to live in the poverty world. They left everything they owned at home and moved across America to start out fresh. Similar to 30 Days, the individual in “Serving in Florida” moved to Florida to try to experience poverty alone.
The Night Waitress Analysis
1041 Words | 5 PagesIn the "Night Waitress by Lynda Hull, the narrator has a lot of concern about her life that she expresses by describing her night at work and the people she encounters while she is there at work. She explores feelings about her appearance, her desires, and her loneliness. The speaker daydreams her way through another monotonous working shift, which reflects on her lower-caste and a disgrace to her employment. Hull analyzes the waitress' performance as disheartening which leads to her desire in a relationship and a materialistic world in which she gets delighted.
Serving In Florida Summary
1336 Words | 6 Pages“Serving in Florida” is a piece of literature that comes from Nickel and Dimed, written by Barbara Ehrenreich that discusses her experience in as an undercover journalist trying to live a life working low-paying jobs. In 1941, Barbara Ehrenreich was born in Butte, Montana, a blue-collar mining town where her father used to work before he earned a degree in the Butte School of Mines and moved the family. Ehrenreich became a part of a middle-class family and attended Rockefeller University where she graduated with a doctorate in biology. However, throughout the years she became more involved with politics, such as advocating for the women’s health movement in the 1970’s and wrote Witches, Midwives, and Nurses: A History of Women Healers. Eventually, she quit her teaching job at State University to become a full-time writer to create pieces relating to the
Nickel And Dimed Rhetorical Analysis
552 Words | 3 PagesNo Nickels or Dimes To Spare In the book, Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich writes the story, “Serving in Florida.” She describes her experience living as an undercover waitress when in reality she’s a journalist for culture and politics with a doctorate in biology. Ehrenreich experiences trying to survive on multiple low income jobs to understand what it is like to be in their shoes instead of being apart of the higher middle class.
Rhetorical Analysis Of Serving In Florida By Barbara Ehrenreich
1012 Words | 5 PagesEhrenreich mentions “The regulation poster in the single unisex rest room admonishes us to wash our hands thoroughly,” in her essay; However, there is almost no one following the instruction because “there is always some vital substance missing—soap, paper towels, toilet paper”. Although workers may want to follow the instructions, it is impossible for them to do so because they “never found all three at once ”. The effect of describing the deficient rest room is to highlight the fact that the owner of the restaurant is so stingy to the workers that the owner refuses to provide enough substance. Thus, the readers can better understand the terrible environment that the workers live in. In short, with mention the dreadful environment of the kitchen and the rest room, the audiences are able to know that lower workers work in a grubby environment and how they have been treated by the upper class.
Tony Mirabelli Learning To Serve Analysis
1028 Words | 5 PagesIn Tony Mirabelli’s writing, “Learning to Serve”, Mirabelli completes an ethnographic study of the service industry. Mirabelli writes on a topic he is quite familiar with, being a waiter. Mirabelli discusses the complexity of being a waiter, although most of these complexities are unknown to people outside of the discourse community. Mirabelli uses his ethnographic study to undermine criticism towards waiters. The main critique Mirabelli rebuts in his writing is that being a waiter does not require skill.
Climbing The Golden Arches Analysis
1413 Words | 6 PagesAcquiring a job, whether it be in a doctor’s office or a fast-food restaurant, can transform a person. Jobs tend to educate employees, either indirectly or directly, both about themselves and life in general. In Climbing the Golden Arches, nineteen year-old Marissa Nuñez discusses how her employment at McDonald’s transformed her into a mature and skilled employee. Within her personal narrative, Nuñez mentioned how she faced both pleasant and unpleasant circumstances while working at McDonald’s, all which prepared her for her future career. At McDonald’s, Nuñez learned how to fulfill her role of being an employee by becoming an expert at all the placed stations, dealing with the various types of customers she encountered on a daily basis, and
Krosoczka's Speech 'Why Lunch Ladies Are Heroes'
1041 Words | 5 PagesMaking a Difference In July 2014, Jarrett J. Krosoczka gave a speech titled “Why Lunch Ladies are Heroes,” during which, he talks about thanking school lunch staffs. He tells the audience how they often feel unappreciated and unimportant. This speech was given at a ted conference to many entrepreneurs and adults.
Nickel And Dimed And Scratch Beginnings Analysis
2296 Words | 10 PagesThe living wage in Charleston was much higher than his eventual wage of $10 an hour, at 11.56, but if he could make at least a sixteen-dollar tip after working for eight hours, he would have been just above the living wage at $12. But even if he did make above the living wage, he would have not achieved his goal of affording his own mode of transportation or his own furnished apartment if not for Crisis
Rhetorical Analysis Of Serving In Florida By Gregory Mantsios
1318 Words | 6 PagesHumor causes the audience to be more drawn to her narrative. Additionally, Ehrenreich establishes pathos by describing the inhumane working conditions in which many Americans must endure in order to survive. Employees are fearful of losing their jobs if they do not meet the certain demands of managers who unfairly exert control on them. This all can result the audience to feel empathic towards not only Ehrenreich, but others who are forced to work under these conditions. Ehrenreich’s narrative proves to be compelling and successfully is able to get the audience to recognize the hard work of low income individuals.
Argumentative Essay On Nickel And Dimed
876 Words | 4 PagesArgumentative Text Essay In the book Nickel and Dimed, written by Barbara Ehrenreich, the author argues how challenging it is to live in a life of poverty. To prove to herself as well as others that this statement is accurate, she makes the decision to experience this lifestyle firsthand by taking low-wage jobs and recording the results. Ehrenreich took on jobs including a maid service, waitressing, and assisting the nursing home to make enough money for a place to sleep and food to eat. The work’s central argument is the fact that minimum and low wage workers face a myriad of difficulties in getting by in America; they receive very low pay, harsh treatments from their employers, and the inability to have an actual life.
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