Nickel and Dimed: Summary and book reviews of Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich, plus links to an excerpt from Nickel and Dimed and a biography of Barbara Ehrenreich.

Millions of Americans work full-time, year-round, for poverty-level wages. In 1998, Barbara Ehrenreich decided to join them. She was inspired in part by the rhetoric surrounding welfare reform, which promised that any job equals a better life. But how can anyone survive, let alone prosper, on $6-$7 an hour? To find out, Ehrenreich moved from Florida to Maine to Minnesota, taking the cheapest lodgings available and accepting work as a waitress, hotel maid, house cleaner, nursing home aide, and Wal-Mart salesperson. She soon discovered that even the "lowliest" occupations require exhausting mental and physical efforts.  And one job is not enough; you need at least two if you intend to live indoors. Nickel and Dimed reveals low-wage America in all its tenacity, anxiety, and surprising generosity--a land of Big Boxes, fast food, and a thousand desperate stratagems for survival. Instantly acclaimed for its insight, humor, and passion, this book is changing the way America perceives its working poor.

Media Reviews

The New York Times - Diana Henriques . . . you will read this explosive little book cover to cover and pass it on to all your friends and relatives.   New York Times One of today's most original writers.   Chicago Tribune Ehrenreich is passionate, public, hotly lucid, and politically engaged.   Ms. Magazine Vivien Labaton Nickel and Dimed is an important book that should be read by anyone who has been lulled into middle-class complacency.   O The Oprah Magazine - Francine Prose Impassioned, fascinating, profoundly significant, and wildly entertaining...I kept grabbing family members and phoning friends to read passages aloud...Nickel and Dimed is not only important but transformative in its insistence that we take a long hard look at the society we live in.   The Boston Globe - Eileen Boris With grace and wit, Ehrenreich discovers . . . the irony of being nickel and dimed during unprecedented prosperity.   Business Week - Anne Colamosca Angry, amusing . . . An in-your-face expose.   Los Angeles Times Book Review - Stephen Metcalf Ehrenreich is a superb and relaxed stylist {with} a tremendous sense of rueful humor.   Newsweek - Susannah Meadows Jarring, full of riveting grit . . . This book is already unforgettable.   Library Journal - Jack Forman Looking back on her experiences, Ehrenreich claims that the hardest thing for her to accept is the invisibility of the poor; one sees them daily in restaurants, hotels, discount stores, and fast-food chains but one doesn't recognize them as poor because, after all, they have jobs. No real answers to the problem but a compelling sketch of its reality and pervasiveness.   Publishers Weekly Delivering a fast read that's both sobering and sassy, she gives readers pause about those caught in the economy's undertow, even in good times.   School Library Journal - Dori DeSpain In a concluding chapter, Ehrenreich takes on issues and questions posed before and during the experiment, including why these wages are so low, why workers are so accepting of them, and what Washington's refusal to increase the minimum wage to a realistic living wage says about both our economy and our culture. Mandatory reading for any workforce entrant.   New York Times Book Review - Dorothy Gallagher We have Barbara Ehrenreich to thank for bringing us the news of America's working poor so clearly and directly, and conveying with it a deep moral outrage and a finely textured sense of lives as lived. As Michael Harrington was, she is now our premier reporter of the underside of capitalism.

Recent Reader Reviews

Rated of 5 by beentheredonethat
eh..unfinished.
I was disappointed in how quickly Barbara retreated! Seemed she didn't try too very hard to explore all possibilities...kinda fell into a stereotypical mindset & setting and then pulled out. thrift stores are a treasure trove of necessities -...   Read More

Rated of 5 by RM
Classism, racism, and herr Ehrenreich
Though my title is harsh, it doesn't compare to the subtle racist and classist innuendo peppering this book. For someone who is prone to Marxist rhetoric, I found it ironic that Ehrenreich fell back on her more comfortable lifestyle in times of...   Read More

Rated of 5 by Robert Holloway
Nickel and Dimed
The book is good,but it fails to state how other low wage workers feel about their jobs. Besides in the end when she quits all the jobs, her so called friends don't even care when she leaves. So working in low wage America isn't necessarily bad....   Read More

Rated of 5 by Christian Jeans
Not very good
I thought Ehrenreich was so so condescending going into this that she never got the full experience. She forgot that these are peoples real lives, she didn't spend enough time to see how it is over a long period of time. She also went into areas...   Read More

Rated of 5 by Vanessa
Reality Check
This book is guaranteed to be ignored or rated low by anyone that is made uncomfortable by the plight of the working poor. It is much easier to believe that people are poor and living in the street because they are lazy or like it. This is...   Read More

Rated of 5 by tmg619
bad
I did not like this book at all, the way it was written made the book boring and pointless to read, a lot of people know its hard to work low wage so do we have to write about it some people may have liked this book and thats ok.

...5 More Reader Reviews

Readalikes

If you liked Nickel and Dimed, try these:

---

---

These are 2 of the 7 readalike suggestions for Nickel and Dimed. Members have full access to all readalikes. If you are a member, please login. To find out more about membership, click here.

Books with similar themes

• History, Current Affairs & Science
  
• USA 
  
• Contemporary 
  
• Controversial Subjects