 July 23, 2004
Hi Barbara,
I could totally relate to those workers in your book. I sort of did an experiment like you did because I left university for two quarters in 2002 so I could intern as an attractions hostess at Disney World. I did not know I was going to be worked like a dog...
Even though I was at the "happiest place on earth", I learned that I could barely get by on $6 an hour working full-time without the financial support of my parents. On top of our low wage, Disney also deducted money from our paychecks to pay for rent/housing where interns lived. And I was doing so much work over there, running and operating attractions and rides with guests running all over the place. I constantly felt overworked and very underpaid. I didn't understand how the full-time employees could withstand the daily madness. But it was no secret that some of them hated their jobs. All you had to do was go to the break room and look at their glum faces.
It really humbled me to know that there were full-time employees doing the same thing that I did trying to get by on $6-7/hr. They were grown-ups and some had families, so they weren't getting hand-outs from parents, like me. There were some workers who held second jobs and there was even a manager at my workplace who had a second job because he wasn't making that much money. And he was a manager!
It just makes me mad to know that rich companies pay some of their workers dirt cheap wages just so they can get more rich. I have lived the low wage life and I learned the hard way that it's not fun- even if you happen to work at a theme park. You can bet that I am going to do something with my degree now that I have recently finished school... Maybe I will write books too.
Name withheld
Torrance, CA
July 25, 2004
Dear Ms. Ehrenreich:
My name is _______ and I am an army wife. My husband has been active duty for over 20 years. I wanted to thank you for addressing the issue of poor pay to our soldiers. However, I am compelled to write to you over a point of argument you bring up within that article. Namely that the military is granted free housing. Yes, the single enlisted soldiers without family members are given barracks rooms. However, those active duty military members that have family that live with them, do pay rent.
Rent is charged for living in housing on post. The Army issues a basic housing allowance with the base pay of the soldier and then directly takes every cent out to cover the rent of the military quarters. Most military housing is substandard by civilian guidelines.
As for the benefit of free medical care, there too is a misunderstanding. The uninformed civilian sector assumes that since the active duty military member's medical expenses are free...then his family members are free as well. We are required to pay a premium that is directly deducted from my husband's pay to cover the medical care for me and our children. Yes, when we are seen at the military clinic assigned to us through our health insurance then we do not have to pay a co-pay. However, if we are referred to a specialist within the civilian sector then we are financially responsible for costs that incur that our medical insurance does not cover.
I was very appreciative of the fact you pointed out so many of our military children are living in poverty. Even though my husband has dedicated over 20 years of his adult life to serve in the U. S. Army, our 4 children qualify for reduced cost lunches. The current concern is that because of that additional 150.00 a month my husband receives for being deployed to Iraq will negate the qualification for those desperately needed lunches.
I admire your work and will follow your writings.
Sincerely,
Name Withheld
August 31 , 2004
Hello.
I just wanted to say that I just finished reading your book. I too am working for $7.00/hr., part-time. Except for me it is not an experiment used as research for a book that I am writing (or at least I haven't written a book yet--I'd like to; a humor book anyway). For whatever reason, I have not been able to get any other job that I have applied for except the one I have now in retail. Believe me, I have tried. I was willing to work two retail jobs if anyone would bother to call me for an interview, but instead I have been scraping together the money from my one part-time job to pay bills over the last year. Since there is no way I could afford to make my car payment and rent/bills, I had to move back in with my mother and grandfather. Luckily they took me back in.
Only working part-time I figured I might as well go back to school to earn a couple more degrees. That's right--I already have a bachelor's and years of good working experience, yet I seem to be among the least employable people around. Is it because I am overeducated and overqualified for many of the jobs out there? Do I not have the right degree? I truly have no explanation.
And I don't think picking up two A.A.s in December is going to help me either since I don't plan on transferring anywhere to work on another bachelor's degree. In the meantime, it is frustrating to have to go back to the same community college you attended ten years ago and work on the same college newspaper. It is rewriting history for me and frankly, it sucks. Especially when I don't really know how it will help in my job search.
So you see, the $7/hr wage is not just for the unskilled or uneducated. Several of the people I work with have graduate degrees (I myself have post-grad study myself), yet we can't find employment and/or make a decent wage. It really puts a damper on the whole push for working hard and going to college so that you can make more money that by just being a high school graduate. I made more money at my part-time job in college than I do now! And I know for a fact that people who did not go to college and maybe didn't make the best grades in high school have an easier time finding work and making more money.
If you decide to do another book similar to Nickle and Dimed, try investigating people like me who didn't have babies in high school, who made good grades, who work hard and don't kiss a lot of ass and instead of getting promoted or paid fairly must regress to working for $7/hr., having their student loans in perpetual deferrment, living at home with their parents, and generally exist in debt of which they feel they may never get out.
Not that I don't feel for the people in your stories, because I think it is shameful how we pay and treat the people who oftentimes do the hardest (and thankless) work. I just wanted to say that it is many times the "educated" who must also hold these unsavory jobs. Don't leave us out!
Thank you.
Lisette Medina
p.s. I wish I had as easy a time finding work as you did! My job now is the only call I even got for an interview where I live!
October 31 , 2004
Aloha! Just wanted to thank you for writing Nickel and Dimed! It's impossible to understand the vicious cycle of poverty and struggle to survive without experiencing it firsthand. My husband died in 1979 and left me with three toddlers. I can still admit that the happiest day of my life, was the day I was able to get off of welfare. I had to take a 'man's job' to finally rise above the poverty level. Thank you, thank you, thank you for bringing to light (for what it's worth, since politicians don't listen anyway) a problem that is out of control. The chasm between the haves and have-nots is so wide and will never lessen unless more people acknowledge the idiocy of policies made without having any real knowledge of the problem. I'm sending my copy of your book to that idiot, Bush.
Rita Place
Kamuela, HI
December 10, 2004
At 49, I have three jobs, no savings, no healthcare, no home of my own, an old car, and a serious case of the jitters.
Though I've made close to the median income for a woman over the past 10 years ($20,000 to $25,000), I've never been able to get ahead on the game board; at times I feel I am endlessly walking a wheel, like those men in a Turkish prison in Midnight Express.
My dear mother, whose Depression-era childhood made her obsessively frugal, used to chide me for not saving. I asked, "How do I save? If I earn $25,000 a year, I might bring home $400 a week after taxes. My rents these past few years have always been up around $700, and they're higher now. So two weeks of my pay goes to rent alone. Add a car payment of $300, and insurance on top of that, and there goes another week. I've then got the last week's pay $400, or a hundred a week -- to pay for every other expense, including utilities, gas, food, all the stuff my kid needs. If the car breaks down or some other minor disaster befalls, whatever I might have squirreled away is gone in one gulp. How do I save? Buy a house? Get a new car? Take a vacation? Buy a hardback book? Shop at Kohl's instead of Value City?"
I decided the only way to save, or to have any kind of disposable income, was to work more than one job. This is a two-income economy, by God, and if the median per capita income of $25,000 only pays for the essentials, single moms better roll up their sleeves. Without another capita under the roof, we have to hustle.
So today, I run a small housecleaning business, teach art at night, paint murals on the weekend, and write on the side. (I know--that's four jobs, not three--but I don't count writing as a paying job.) I missed much of my daughter's childhood, and now that she's 19, I'm just beginning to know how much I regret that, and will regret it. For years, I bought her clothes, and my own, at thrift stores, and we lived on ramen soup, cans of corn and milk. When I recently apologized, a bit tearfully, for the lean times, that good girl said gently, "But Mom, I always liked that soup."
The hungry years were supposed to have ended by now, but I am still on the wheel, and as I approach my 50s, it troubles me to know I have no health care, and no ability to pay for insurance. I pray each day that I will stay well until I can afford a health plan, or get back into a job that will provide one. Meantime, when I'm sick, I simply don't acknowledge it. Last year, I had two severe bouts of what I think was bronchitis, or walking pneumonia. I think, but I'm not sure, because I couldn't afford to see a doctor. Recently, I suffered through the loss of two old molars that should have been pulled. It took weeks and considerable pain before they came out, but I toughed it out with OTC painkillers. Six weeks ago, I broke a toe. A small matter, but I couldn't go to the doctor, and I certainly couldn't miss work, so I soldiered on, climbing ladders to paint, cleaning houses, teaching, never missing a day of work, and consequently reinjuring my foot at every turn.
I think I'm mostly healthy though. Back in spring, I experienced sharp chest pains, which finally drove me to the ER. The techs checked me up and down, did an MRI, EEG, something else. Said I was fine, just under a little too much stress.
Gee, ya think so?
The tests cost $3,100. I will be paying them off for the next two years. |
