Nickel And Dimed: America's Working Poor

America’s Working Poor Tens of millions of men and women in America struggle because they are stressed out about not making enough money even though they are working as hard as possible. In her book Nickel and Dimed, journalist, Barbara Ehrenreich writes about her research working as a minimum wage employee attempting to get by in Americas tough economy, she describes in depth the struggles that the minimum wage workers suffer through and she witnesses them first hand as she goes under cover and works these jobs herself. Middle class jobs are being replaced by low income jobs, the people in these jobs are referred to as "the working poor”,and are not able to make ends meet at the end of the month. People in America working minimum wage jobs struggle on a daily bases to get by, this causes them anxiety due to their lack of a health care plan, living situations, and
Health insurance premiums are rising and some employers no longer offer this benefit, the low wage workers are the ones that are particularly affected by this major issue.Employees without health coverage, are unable to get preventative care or proper treatment for an illness, may become sicker later on. In chapter one of her book “Serving in Florida” Ehrenreich describes her co worker Gail’s situation, “Gail, for example,... is supposed to be on the company health plan by now, but they claim they have lost her application form and to be beginning the paper work all over again. So she spends $9 a pop for pills to control the migraines she wouldn’t have, she insist, if her estrogen supplements were covered.” (27) Without the company behind them, employees will end up paying more for individual health coverage than their employers would have paid to put them on group coverage. Similar to Ehrenreich’s situation, Morgan Spurlock and his fiance Alex attempt to survive 30 days living of a minimum wage salary, as n the TV episode