Nickle and Dimed Book Review

Barbara Ehrenreich's, “Nickle and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America”, is a book that strives to change the way Americans perceive the working lower class. Integrated into the book is a journal of the time spent by the author, with her true identity concealed from others, working in order to discovery whether she could maintain a basic life style working minimum wage jobs. She soon realizes that this is not such a simple task. This mere experiment Ehrenreich conducted brought to light the struggles that is a detriment to many other people, such as stress in the work place, lack of funding for basic living items, and not only physical but mental exhaustion as well.
In this book , the author uses clear and vivid descriptions from her personal journal to place mental pictures in the readers minds. Moreover, at the bottom of some of the page are facts that pertain to what she is writing about, it adds more information and credibility to the book. Ehrenreich not only explains her living conditions working minimum wage jobs but also the those of her coworkers. Thus reader is once again reminded that this isn’t just a book, it's real life. The readers will often see that she tells subtle jokes which are often masked with sadness and reality.
The subject of   the working lower class trying to make ends meet hits close to home for me, literally. A few times throughout Ehrenreich's experiment she has been employed as a waitress in a small “hole in the wall” restaurant, my mother currently works as a waitress at a restaurant similar to that. Every financial problem that occurred during the author's experiment, I already have. Every complaint that the author has had about costumers not tipping as they should, or complaints about the aches and pains, I have already heard. All the descriptions the author gave about taking the same sandwich to work everyday, I have already had to pack. However, this book has made me come to the realization that there are people even worse...