Artwork by
Dennis Murphy

For the students, by the students

Author Nickels and Dimes on Society Thoughout Life
Joe Wilson, Corner Post Staff

“I thought it was the assignment from hell,” says Barbara Ehrenreich at her lecture last Thursday on her book Nickel and Dimed: On (not) getting by in America. Ehrenreich took several minimum wage jobs to see what it takes to live at the poverty line.

The beginning of her lecture focused on the problems in defining who the poor are. She said that many more people live in poverty than the government tells us and the problem lies in the formula for poverty.

The poverty line is calculated by an outdated formula based on food prices. It doesn’t take into account housing, transportation, childcare or many other factors that should be weighed. This makes it very inaccurate.

Housing was one of Ehrenreich’s biggest problems. As she moved across the country affordable housing could not be found. Most “unskilled” jobs pay $7.00 an hour and basic housing tends to be $650.00 a month. She said that the math doesn’t add up. People making $7.00 an hour cannot afford housing that costs $650 a month. She found the biggest problem in paying for housing was trying to come up with the first months rent and a security deposit on $7.00 an hour.

Ehrenreich learned that most of her fellow workers did not live in apartments or tenement housing. Many slept in cars or in residential hotels whose biggest draw to the low-wage worker is no first months rent. The motels low-wage workers are forced into are not like Motel-8’s or Holiday Inns, she said they are grubby, unsafe facilities. She said she had it better than many of the people who lived in the motels she stayed in. She was just one person. Whole families lived in the same rooms at the motels.

Ehrenreich said there were several keys to surviving at the poverty line. One was to live with others who were working so everyone can pool their resources. Another was to work more than one job to make ends meet. She attests that this is not a fun, easy or a practical way to try to live.

Class polarization became a major point later in her lecture as she talked about how the rich are getting richer and the number of poor people is rising daily. She complained of the shrinking middle class and widespread poverty that is going unnoticed by the current government.

“Poverty and class polarization are not natural phenomenon,” she said.

Ehrenreich concluded the lecture with four points to help the “poor problem” in America.

• Unions. Labor unions allow workers to negotiate for better wages. Wal-Mart though fires or promotes workers who talk about forming a union. It’s their method of keeping labor quiet. It is illegal to be fired for being in a union and Wal-Mart has received a lot of criticism for its practices.
  
• Public Housing. Affordable housing is one of Ehrenreich’s biggest concerns. Housing is so expensive its cost takes away the money of the people who need it most.
  
• Universal Health Insurance. The idea of a person’s health being bound to their job is an outrage according to Ehrenreich.
  
• Living Wage Laws. The living wage is a pay determined by certain cities. The pay is determined by taking into account the cost of living in that city. Living Wage laws bar a city from doing business with a company that does not pay its workers at least the living wage.
  

Jesse's Auditoriums lower level was full of students, faculty and activists of all ages. But by the end of the lecture and question-and-answer session, only a few of die-hard activists were left and almost no students. It is scary to think that despite the freshman being required to read the book, no one was interested enough to stay and listen to the grass-roots political movements in Columbia

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