By Barbara EhrenreichLast summer I undertook an unusual journalistic experiment: I set out to see whether it is possible to live on the kind of wages available to low-skilled workers. The math wasn't very promising, but since no one seems to pay much attention when I rant about low wages in print, I decided to test it in person. I structured my experiment around a few rules: I had to find the cheapest apartment and best-paying job I could, and I had do my level best to hold it—no sneaking off to read novels in the ladies room or agitating for a union. So, in early June, I moved out of my home near Key West and into a $500 efficiency apartment about a 45-minute drive from town. I would have preferred the trailer park right on the edge of town, but they wanted over $600 a month for a one-person trailer. Yes, these are frightfully high rents, but no higher than you'll find in most places where tourists compete for lodging space with the people who fry their hash browns. Finding a job turned out to be a little harder than I'd expected, given all the help-wanted signs in town. Finally, at one of the big corporate discount hotels where I'd applied for a housekeeping job, I was told they needed a waitress in the associated "family restaurant."
 | | | | | Barbara Ehrenreich is the author of more than a dozen books on politics and society, most recently, Blood Rites: Origins and History of the Passions of War. In the following essay, Ehrenreich describes her attempt to survive as a low-wage worker—an experience that shows why too many full-time workers can barely pay the rent. | |  | | |
|  |
The pay was only $2.43 an hour, but I figured with tips, I would do far better than I would have at the supermarket, which was offering $6 an hour and change.
I was wrong. Business was slow, and tips averaged 10 percent or less, even for the more experienced "girls." I was curious as to how my fellow workers managed to pay their rent on this kind of income and soon found out that a lot of them didn't. The immigrant dishwashers (from Haiti and the Czech Republic) mostly lived in dormitory-type situations or severely overcrowded apartments. As for the servers, some were technically homeless. They just didn't think of themselves that way because they had cars or vans to sleep in. I was shocked to find that a few were sharing motel rooms costing $40 to $60 a night, and I'm talking about middle-aged women, not kids. When I naively suggested to one co-worker that she could save a lot of money by getting an apartment, she pointed out that the initial expense—a month's rent in advance and security deposit—was way out of her reach.
Meanwhile, my own financial situation was declining perilously. The money I saved on rent was being burned up as gas for commuting. Without a well-stocked kitchen, I couldn't make up big, economical dishes and freeze them ahead for the week, so I was spending too much on fast food. I began to realize it's actually more expensive to be poor than middle class: You pay more for food, especially in convenience stores; you pay to get checks cashed; and you can end up paying ridiculous prices for shelter.
| |  | |
| | | | "Even in an economy celebrating unequaled prosperity, a person can work full-time or even more, and not make enough to live on." —Barbara Ehrenreich | |
| |
| |  | |
I decided to redouble my efforts to survive. First, I got a waitressing job at a higher-volume restaurant, where my pay averaged about $7.50 an hour. Then I moved out of my apartment and into the trailer park, calculating that, without the commute, I'd be able to handle an additional job. A few of my fellow workers held two jobs, and they didn't look any stronger than I am. For a total of three days altogether, I did work two jobs—including a hotel housekeeping job I finally landed.
This did not, however, turn out to be a viable lifestyle. Exhaustion was only one part of the problem: I never could figure out how to get my various uniforms laundered in the short time I had between shifts, and you only get one uniform per job.
At the end of the month, I had to admit defeat. I had earned less than I spent, and the only things I spent money on were food, gas and rent. If I had had children to care for and support—like the many women now coming off welfare—I wouldn't have lasted a week.
But my experiment did succeed in showing that, even in an economy celebrating unequaled prosperity, a person can work hard, full-time or even more, and not make enough to live on, at least if she intends to live indoors. I left thinking that if this were my real life, I would become an agitator in no time at all, or at least a serious nuisance.
For a more detailed account of Ehrenreich's experience, see "Nickel-and-Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America" (Harper's Magazine, January 1999).
