January 31st, 2024
This book is pretty much about a white woman writer/journalist who goes "undercover" and works crap jobs for crap money after Clinton's welfare reforms in the late 90's force many welfare recipients, especially single mothers, back to work. The author outright admits she cannot fully emulate being in this situation because of several reasons. First, the mental stress of this being your life is not really there; it is only temporary and her real life is still waiting for her. Second, she is not raising any kids. I think she could have simulated this by buying additional food and whatever for a pretend child and just donating it, though this is only monetary and does not take into account the time and presence requirements of raising a child. Third, while being a woman brings its difficulties, being a white American does not. She does one month in 3 locations and I personally do not think one month at a place is long enough. You barely have to pay rent. She admittedly starts off "cheating", using her real life savings for a down payment for rent. Some people she works with in Key West (near her own Florida home) do not even have that much. While the idea of the book is nice, the first part in Florida is more like a novella about how much being a waitress sucks. It was surprisingly difficult for her to find a job, since many of the "wanted" ads were just placeholders without a real open position. She describes her coworkers and work conditions of two different restaurants and her one day as a hotel room cleaner. She ended up walking out on the restaurant after mistreatment, which she takes as a defeat. I don't see it that way; quitting a job out of spite is a wonderful feeling. Maybe not so much when you're struggling to make rent. I'm not sure if she would have even made rent, but we'll never know because she moves on to the next town.
February 1st, 2024
I'm burning through this book pretty quickly. Not that I don't like it, but it's just a very simple and easy read and doesn't give one much to think about it. It's just a personal story about something we all (well, not all) know: being poor sucks and low-paying jobs suck. The author spends a month in Portland, Maine because, as she explicitly points out, it is extremely white. In Florida, she was ushered away from certain jobs which were delegated to minorities, like room-keeping. Here in Portland, white people got all the jobs, so a white lady in a crappy job doesn't stick out like a sore thumb. She jumps out the gate trying to get two jobs to afford rent, and affordable housing that isn't abysmal is hard to find. One job is a weekend job in the cafeteria at a retirement home on the Alzheimer's ward. She doesn't dwell on this one much other than the fact that sometimes it's understaffed and that she was able to get a job like this, with medically dependent people, with no qualifications and essentially just walked in from the street. The main gig is a maid service. I was trying to think where I saw one of these on TV, and now I think it was a Nathan For You episode. The author is one of those maids who drive around in a team of 4 to wealthy people's homes and clean. It's back-breaking work. The vacuum is strapped to one's back, like a Ghostbuster I guess. They get no mops and clean the floors on their hands and knees. They work longer than the advertised hours and get no overtime for this. The girls and women she works with are better off than the Florida people, in the sense that there is less car-living, but still a good number of living at home or with an absurd number of co-inhabitants. The owner man seems to have some sort of cult of personality, where the maids seek his approval. They work through pain and illness. The author says she gets treated like a second-class citizen when in public in her uniform. At the end she tells her team that she is leaving and it was all for a book, and the reaction is lukewarm and mostly uninterested. Obviously, it is a rough life as a maid. That's why I just never clean.
February 2nd, 2024
The last trip to Minneapolis is not as interesting as the first two. The first half of it was spend on looking for a job and a place to live, which was the interesting part. All the lodgings were terrible and too expensive, and this will be her downfall. She even kind of cheated at first and spend the first week rent-free, bird-sitting for a friend. Jobs were hard to get, but she ended up with an interview at Wal-Mart and at some Home Depot type store. Both jobs were contingent on a drug test, and she was worried she may not pass. Luckily for her and the book, she passes. There is no “job offer”, just immediate orientation. The hardware store is weird since someone tells her $10 an hour, which would have been great, but someone else contradicts it. It’s shady so she goes with Wal-Mart at $7. From here, it gets dull. I think we all have seen enough about Wal-Mart to know that it sucks to work there, the customers suck, the pay sucks, etc. All that said, her job is just boring. She puts clothes back on racks and that is it. Nothing interesting happens. If she had made enough money doing it to get a place to live and some decent food, it would be fine. However, $7 an hour does not get you those things. She keeps trying different places but they are all full and the one she lives in is sketchy. She tries a motel, but daily rates are ridiculous. At this point, she runs out of her allotted funds and has to call ti off.
February 3rd, 2024
The last section is the author’s evaluation of her work and it’s the best part of the book. As far as work itself went, she did fine. She worked hard and did well at her jobs. The problem then comes from the fact that doing her job well was not enough to keep her head above water. The cost of rent significantly outpaces wages and a plurality, if not majority, of someone’s wages go to their living accommodations. A single person often cannot afford an apartment and must rely on someone else to meet the rent. Worse, people cannot afford to save up for the safety deposit and are stuck living week to week for more money or daily at a motel. A second job is required to get ahead. While wages have technically gone up, they are still below their peak in the 70s when adjusted for inflation. 25 years later, little has changed. It must be worse, since wages are stagnant and everything has gone up. The author didn’t talk about food much, and at this period of time it seemed that spending on food as a percentage of income has gone down. Some foods are expensive, but I think food can still be bought fairly cheaply. A box of pasta costs $1. One problem that the book made me aware of is that some low income housing lacks a kitchen. Especially if you’re in a motel, all you have is a microwave, if that. This country needs subsidized housing like some places in Europe, such as Vienna, not to mention health and child care. There’s no reason for anyone to struggle to survive in this country.