Nickel and Dimed / Walmart
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posted by Mr. Webb | Tuesday, November 11, 2008
49 Comments:
Well first off, I just want to say that while I personally despise Wal-Mart, I also understand that circumstances make everyone different and if anyone likes Wal-Mart, that is Okie Dokie with me. The video Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices is obviously biased and only talks about the numerous bad things about this economic giant, and there is sure to be hundreds of families that have benefitted from Wal-Mart in some way, out there in the world.
However; Wal-Mart can be summed up in one word for me. Fake. Phenix Montgomery, one of the employees of Wal-Mart interviewed in the documentary, said “You go to work knowing that you’re not making enough money . . . bet yet you gotta go with a smile on your face, and fake it.” I've been inside Wal-Mart several times, and every time the atmosphere was awful. The employees were grumpy; the people shopping there were grumpy. These were just average days, not holidays or sales. The only thing smiling was the industries copyrighted smiley face!
After watching Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices, and hearing personal accounts, it simply justified my opinion even more. Wal-Mart seems more fake then I thought, simply proven through the words of employees who stepped forward. Accounts of racism, discrimination, low wages and pitiful medical insurance, and basically not caring at all from upper management down to the night janitors in absolutely ridiculous. Not to mention literal commercial promises made to the communities that never pull through.
This is just Wal-Mart in general. Thank goodness our local Wal-Mart doesn't make the statistics of children on Medicaid that were shown on the video, or have problems with government subsidies. At least that we know of. There are hundreds of lawsuits from wronged employees who worked overtime, and accounts of women’s rights being exempt in that they cannot achieve manager positions. When employees are asked to work overtime, they are literally forced to at the expense of their jobs because Wal-Mart can always replace them. All of this is done with a smile. “Work at Wal-Mart, its better than getting kicked in the nuts!”
Ok I have to agree 100% with Laura. I don't shop at Wal-Mart for the same reason she doesn't and yet I have had so many people get on my case about it and honestly the stuff that is not really that great. And the only reason that they can afford the low prices is because of the way their labor is. The quality isn't all that great either. I don't get anything from Wal-Mart because so many of the things that I ever bought from Wal-Mart has all fallen apart or broken a lot faster than the same item that I bought from Target. The thing with target is that the employees get health care and some financial aid and they even give scholarships for college. Wal-Mart on the other hand works more just as a job for money and as Laura pointed out the environment in the Wal-Mart stores isn’t very friendly. I have never gone into a Wal-Mart and seen a real smile from any of the workers.
I think that one thing to think about is whether or not it really is possible to live on the money that the people do make. I honestly make just above minimum wage and some people don’t realize how expensive things are until they have to spend their own money. I have hit that reality and I am blown away with the price of things and how fast the money that I make spends. I even have gotten to the point where since I work in a buffet restaurant I help people get the better deal and some places will do the same thing to consumers. I think that the economy is really getting out of hand and it may come to the point where people are stuck with the job they hate but the only reason they are keeping it is because they are getting paid and no one else is hiring.
One thing that I think that people can’t make a huge deal over is the fact that there is racism and not caring for anyone is that all companies have this problem some worse than others but there is still that problem where ever the work world takes anyone. The work force isn’t perfect and in the perfect work force there is no problems and everyone is happy but then where does that put people who don’t have the skills to do the job they want or the people who can’t afford to work as many hours as their dream job requires? What would this world be without hardship and struggle? I think that the stores like Wal-Mart help to make other people realize what they could have done and that the choices that people make are the ones that they could be stuck with for the rest of their live.
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Laura W includes in her reasons for not liking Wal-Mart the employees being grumpy, but that is completely understandable. Phenix Montgomery says when interviewed in Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices that he goes to work and “dignity is not there; pride is not there.” Then, the CEO, Lee Scott states, the corporation is “troubled by” their employees’ status. I know that personally, I would be in capable of going to work at a place day after day where my employers had striped my pride and then stand tall and tell the public that they are truly concerned for my wellbeing. Further, to know that if any of the Wal-Mart employees took a stand to make conditions better for themselves, they could lose their jobs, gives Wal-Mart all of the power. As is shown early in Nickel and Dimed when Barbara Ehrenreich searches for a job in Key West, “finding a job is a matter of being on the right place at the right time and flexible enough to take whatever is offered that day” (15). To further support Ehrenreich’s personal struggle with finding a job, an article from Associated Press reports shows unemployment rates being at 6.7 percent, which is the highest it has been in fifteen years (“Dollar Gains . . .”). These devastating numbers allow employers like Wal-Mart and the many places Ehrenreich works to treat their employees terrible hanging the threat of firing over them, because to many of the employees the choice is the terrible job with little money and only a few benefits or no job with no money and no benefits.
What amazes me about the working conditions of these low-wage jobs is the relation and treatment employees receive not by corporate workers but the direct supervisors and managers. Management positions are generally positions given through promotion to employees who have worked through multiple positions at the company. It amazes me that an employee can be promoted to a management position and turn on his (or rarely her) employees knowing firsthand what treatment they are receiving. This just further shows the power of the corporation, because management positions are not any more available than the low-wage jobs of serving food, sorting clothes, or being a cashier. In the same way it forces employees to keep their job under terrible conditions, the corporation now manipulates the managers to inflict the horrible treatment on those employees.
“Dollar Gains On Safety Bet As Unemployment Grows.” Associated Press (Dec. 2008). Forbes.com. 5 Dec. 2008. Forbes.com. 7 Dec. 2008. < www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2008/12/05/ap5787423.html >
One thing about the Wal-Mart movie that annoyed me was that the creator made it sound like Wal-Mart is the only company that does these horrible things. In fact, EVERY company does the exact, if not worse, things. McDonald's pays it's employees a bonus for every restaurant nearby that they put out of business. A few years ago, Borders opened up at Southwest Plaza Mall and put Waldon Books out of business. Waldon Books was a "mom and pop" store just like the ones in the Wal-Mart movie. According to the Starbucks Union, "Starbucks workers in the United States earn as little $6, $7, or $8 per hour," just like Wal-Mart workers. The Starbucks Union website even states that "Starbucks insures a lower percentage of its workforce [for healthcare] than Wal-Mart." Just because you do not shop at Wal-Mart does not mean that you are not still supporting what Wal-Mart does. The only way to avoid companies that abuse their employees and get their products from undesirable sources is to make your own food and clothes yourself. Now, I am NOT supporting what Wal-Mart or any of these other companies are doing. I would just like to point out that Wal-Mart is no different than any other major company. Making the Wal-Mart movie seems completely pointless to me. It seems like the creator just has a personal grudge against Wal-Mart and wanted to make a movie to bash on Wal-Mart, without considering that there might be other companies out there that do exactly the same thing. The issues needed to be addressed, not specific companies.
"Why are Starbucks Workers Joining a Union?." Starbucks Workers Union. 12 November 2008. Starbucks Workers Union. 10 Dec 2008 http://www.starbucksunion.org/node/1173.
Brittany H has a point about all big corporations treating their workers poorly and putting smaller businesses down the drain. However, I'm not so sure that the maker of the Wal-Mart movie was predjudice against the company. I think the movie was made because Wal-Mart is the biggest corporation that is stomping on the little ones. It is stomping on little businesses all over the world.
In Barbara Ehrenreich's book, it starts out as a simple scientific experiment, and the reader doesn't neccisarily think about the emotional effects. The best example, during the part when shes working at a Wal-Mart in Minnesota, is " It's the clothes I relate to, though, not the customers. . . I start to own the place. . .I don't fondle the clothes, I snap them into place. . .In this frame of mind, the last thing I want to see is a customer rifling around, disturbing the place."(166) I think this explains almost completely why, I, atleast, have had bed experiences through Wal-Mart mainly because of the grumpy and rude employees. If one works in such a monotonous place for so long it'd be hard not to react in that way. The clothes coming before the customers. In this scenario she didn't neccissarily lash out at a customer, but if I had come through there and switched a couple t-shirts around, that would explain why the employee working that area would give me the snooty once-over and the bored and annoyed "can I help you."
Steph O says "It amazes me that an employee can be promoted to a management position and turn on his (or rarely her) employees knowing firsthand what treatment they are receiving." It astounds me to, but I can also see how, after being in such a broken record job, anything that breaks up the dulldrums would be great, and that employee would feel superior. "Plus the fact that shes worked here two years, during which her pay has shot up to $7.75 an hour. She counsels patience." (179) That seems ridiculous to me. These monotonous days are also supported by Barbara's own words, " I have been discovering the great truth about low-wage work. . . the same thing always happens, which amounts to, day after day, nothing. . . You could get old pretty fast here.(186)"
One issue that I wish the Wal-Mart movie had addressed was the fact that many companies move to other countries to get the cheap labor there, which takes jobs away from people here. My uncle lost his job because the company moved to Mexico to save money for them. I would like to know if Wal-Mart or any of these other large companies did that.
A negative thing I notice about Wal-Mart and other large stores is how dirty they are. Every time I come home from the grocery store, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, or other similar stores, I want to wash my hands as soon as possible. That is definitely what annoys me the most about stores, especially department stores. With the amount of people that come into those stores each day, the owners should clean the stores more often to get rid of germs.
Well Brittany, a comment I have to make about your statement when you said,"A negative thing I notice about Wal-Mart and other large stores is how dirty they are. Every time I come home from the grocery store, Wal-Mart, K-Mart, or other similar stores, I want to wash my hands as soon as possible." One thing I have to say about that is that just because It is a big company like Wal-Mart that doesn't mean it's automatically dirty. It's because so many people go there. I mean have you ever taken a library book and wiped it with a paper towel, it's pretty gross. It's because so many people have touched it. So back to Wal-Mart. Contrary to what Brittany said about the movie not taling about countries that shipped jobs to places outside the U.S. in fact they did. The movie talked about the female Chinese worker who worked in the Wal-Mart factory and her daily routine
And din;t get me wrong, giving people who don't even live in this country jobs that could be going to americans is a bad thing. Because big companies depend on jobs overseas that makes the global ecomomy a big chain reaction. If our companies fail which then in turn leads to a high unemployment rate in and out of the U.S. which then leads to people losing their jobs overseas which then makes the world stock market fall leading to a big economic collapse. Like what we had earlier this year.
First off, Wal-Mart is not necessarily dirty. The feeling of “want[ing] to wash my hands as soon as possible” (Brittany H W) is not because of the grimy conditions of the store. We, as relatively well off middle class Americans, only think it’s dirty because of the people that tend to shop there and their lowlife appearances. This is a stereotype. “Those people” probably take showers and use their generic deodorant each and every day. The only difference between them and us is they appreciate the good deals Wal-Mart offers. We also find the actual buildings are very well kept. Employees clean constantly as we find when Barb, in Nickel and Dimed, works for Wal-Mart. She works for hours and hours and does nothing except clean up after customers. She even says “I start to own the place"(166). To the employees, Wal-Mart becomes a home and a refuge and therefore they will do whatever it takes to keep it clean for the customers that choose to shop there.
A more pressing issue that needs to be addressed is that of Wal-Mart’s (non-existent) benefits. Nickel and Dimed explains how many of the employees do not put their own healthcare as a priority in the workplace. They are not paid enough to buy the awful healthcare offered to them by Wal-Mart. They are only allowed two fifteen minute breaks and in that short time are expected to do whatever it takes to be rested for the long hours ahead. Many employees cannot afford lunch, let alone a home to comfortably live in.
So the question is why they are not getting a better job. This point is also addressed in Nickel and Dimed. When working somewhere for a number of years one becomes attached to the friends, the rules, the clothes, and the bosses they have grown accustomed to. Employees do not want to go through the hassle of drug tests, questioners, and long interviews. So they make due with what they have and will continue to suffer through Wal-Mart’s ridiculous requirements for such little income.
It’s is important as we discuss any issue or opinions that came about from watching the Wal-Mart video, the bias that it carries. I agree with Brittany H when, on December 10, she said, “It seems like the creator just has a personal grudge against Wal-Mart.” Even Laura W addressed this briefly in her very first post. There is clearly some intent in the producer of Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices to put down and make Wal-Mart look bad. According to one of Wal-Mart’s fact sheets, roughly 1.4 million Americans work for them (“Wal-Mart’s . . . “). Less than one hundred of those employees were interviewed on the movie. I am sure, that if the producer would have been producing a movie promoting Wal-Mart, they could have found one hundred employees who could have said good things about their jobs, their bosses, etc. This does not change the facts that the movie used against Wal-Mart, but it is like the strategy many teenagers use called selective hearing or choosing only to tell their parents the information that help their case. We leave out facts, valuable and true as they may be, because they go against the point we are trying to make. I am not trying to defend Wal-Mart, and I certainly believe they are not free of faults, but I also believe everything in the movie cannot be taken at face value as the whole truth. Even Barbara Ehrenreich is careful not to let her personal experience create bias in her research. She is getting a fist-hand encounter with these conditions, but tries to share the experience from a more removed view, having been on both sides of the services. A lot of the proof for her ability not to include too much bias comes from her foot notes. For example, on page 76 Ehrenreich talks about some of her further research into the unsanitary cleaning methods of The Maids, but then flips the coin to talk about some faults, or at least cruel tactics, used by the consumer including surveillance cameras and intentional messes to check The Maids work (92). Although she is not free of bias or personal opinion, at least Ehrenreich offers a more balanced view.
Gina H addresses the “pressing issue” of lack of benefits, lack of breaks, and such work conditions. The movie made it sound as if it were impossible for employees to do anything about this. A major piece tying into this was the single fight for a union. Again, this plays with the intense bias of the movie. There are currently laws that mandate the freedom for unions to exist where they are wanted, so if the Wal-Mart employees, the majority of the 1.4 low-wage workers, not the minority of corporate employees, really wanted a union, they could get it. Even in the movie, half of the employees in the particular Wal-Mart that was highlighted for trying to get a union started, refused the union. There must be some reason for this. The employees collectively, may not agree that their work environment is absolutely fabulous, but they must believe it is at least decent or they could get a union.
“Wal-Mart’s Commitment Translates into Support for Multicultural Communities.” Wal-Mart. 21 July 2008. Walmart.com. 15 Dec. 2008. < www.walmartstores.com/FactsNews/FactSheets/#EmploymentandDiversity >.
Many people have just mentioned the movie and I would like to comment on the book itself. Barbara Ehrenreich is a daring woman. I cannot even believe what it is like going from having everything, as a writer, to nothing as a cleaner, waitress, and working at Wal-Mart. She allows herself to “forget” about all of her prior knowledge and training on how to get a job and falls back to square one. This task was hard to not involve her everyday life but she continually reminded herself “that I wasn’t working for money, I was doing research for an article and later a book.(8)”
But many of my peers have mentioned how Wal-mart workers are grumpy. Not all of them are. I do not know what Wal-mart you guys are going too, but the customer service is the same as at a Forever 21, or at Best Buy. It is not always the fact that they are grumpy because they work in Wal-mart. It is more generalized. In general working eight hours and earning minimum wage is stressful. Especially if working two jobs. It is not only the employees at Wal-mart. Yes I agree that the benefits are not fair, but money is an issue in many work areas. Steph O W said, “I am sure, that if the producer would have been producing a movie promoting Wal-Mart, they could have found one hundred employees who could have said good things about their jobs, their bosses, etc.” I completely agree. It is the mind set that people go into when they arrive at work. They say “I’m going to have a good day” or “Today is going to be hell.” If workers go in positive their day is most likely to be better than going in already with a negative attitude.
Also in the book I couldn’t believe the stereotypes and it opened my eyes to reality. How a cleaning person is typically an African American, Spanish-speaker, or refugees from the Central European post-Communist world.(29) And how waitresses are typically white. It is a broad stereotype because this is still common to see this, but if someone applies for a cleaning job and they are white, I don’t think the bosses would tell them No…be a waitress. But I couldn’t believe that Barbara Ehrenreich applied for a clean job in a hotel and didn’t get it because of her color. It was a higher paying job and I felt like she deserved it because that is what she wanted.
One thing I noticed while reading Nickel and Dimed was that Barbara Ehrenreich jumped from job to job fairly quickly. While she was not making enough money in any of the jobs she had, it seems that it would cost more to move from different states. Wouldn't it be easier to apply at different jobs? I know it is hard to get a job, but it would save more money waiting for job and keeping living conditions than just packing up and throwing money into traveling and starting over. Overall, Ehrenreich seemed to spend more of her own money than actually making money in her various low class jobs.
But then what happens to the people who do not have the money to start over in another state? In one of Ehrenreich jobs a co-worker would have quit but could not afford to pick up and leave. Considering the jobs Ehrenreich had, it is not worth it to quit a job to move. The jobs were either just as bad if not worse.
While working at Wal-mart Ehrenreich saw co-workers shopping at Wal-mart. On the Wal-mart movie employees of Wal-mart shopped there also. Wal-mart pays its employees and they go and put the money back into Wal-mart. Doesn't this kind of defeat the purpose of a job? Is Wal-mart the only place they can afford to shop? Wal-mart seems to be the one thing that benefits from this cycle, when it already makes billions of dollars from cheap labor and underpaying employees.
Rachel H makes a good point that it’s not just Wal-mart that has “grumpy” people working. It’s everywhere. I believe that this is true about many of the other negative aspects of Wal-mart that were mentioned in the movie. Germs, benefits, crime rates, the list goes on.
Also going off of what Rachel H said, I too noticed the big emphasis put on race and stereotypes in the book. The very first sentence of the second section of the book says, “I chose Maine for its whiteness”. It then goes on to say, “Not only were the professors and students white, which is of course not uncommon; so were the hotel house keepers, the panhandlers, and the cab drivers, who, in addition to being white also spoke English” (51). The emphasis put on race and stereotypes in this book was insane. Just like Rachel H, I never really understood how big a part of our world this is.
Along the lines of what Breanna C said about it being too expensive to pack up, move states and start all over again, I wonder if it was just for the sake of the book that she packed up and moved somewhere else. Maybe it could have been to see if lower class could differ from one state to another or to experiment with the race and stereotypes issue. Just a random thought.
Rachel H touched on an excellent point when she said, “I do not know what Wal-mart you guys are going too, but the customer service is the same as at a Forever 21, or at Best Buy. It is not always the fact that they are grumpy because they work in Wal-mart. It is more generalized.” People are not just grumpy at Wal-Mart but rather it is a common phenomenon among stores all over. For us to sit here and decide we don’t like Wal-Mart for reasons like the fact that it is dirty or that the employees are not always in a great mood is not only shallow, but unfair. We are acting extremely biased and choosing to ignore the flaws of other companies and focussing our attention to just one of the many corporations with the same flaws. Of course if we search really hard we will find small reasons to dislike something, but we have to evaluate how important those problems are and how they uniquely represent the company they are representing. If the previously stated complaints about Wal-Mart are the only reasons we don’t like Wal-Mart then we are missing the entire point of the documentary. The people who filmed this wanted to show you some of the larger effects of big corporations and the negative impact they have around them. They discussed some very serious issues such as bad healthcare, discrimination, environmental hazards, sweatshops, and unsafe parkinglots. Next to all of these major problems, do such shallow points hold much importance? We are failing to look beyond ourselves to the overall scheme of things.
We need to stop wasting so much of our attention on the shallow and insignificant problems and begin focussing on the significant ones. Whether we like Wal-Mart or not, we need to study deeper on the charges it has been given and find the truth. If Wal-Mart is indeed the monter that the documentarty claims it to be, we need to focus on the major issues it has created and find ways to put an end to them. If Wal-Mart and the other companies are truly doing all that they have been acused of, we need to find solutions to fix them. It is one thing to find the problems, but it is an entirely different thing to solve them.
Before hearing about the blog topic and before watching the Wal-Mart movie, I had never heard or knew anything about Wal-Mart being a bad place to shop. And to be completely honest, after having watched the movie I didn’t feel as moved as I thought I would be. The intent of the Movie—to educate America about the grim issues that Wal-Mart is producing and try get something done about it—was almost too biased. Such issues created by Wal-Mart, which Amber R listed, include “bad healthcare, discrimination, environmental hazards, sweatshops, and unsafe parking lots.” Although these are serious problems and they should definitely be put to an end, I still felt, as many others in this blog seem to have, that there was just a bias toward Wal-Mart because there are many other big corporations that are guilty of the same crimes. Starbucks, as Brittany H researched, is treating its employees unfairly. So, do not get me confused, I am totally against what Wal-Mart is doing and the movie was still an eye-opener for me, but I guess I still feel like I have to play Devil’s advocate by not feeling much sympathy for the ones that work at Wal-Mart because every time the employees would talk about how much they despise everything about their working conditions I just kept asking, “if it is so terrible than why do the employees continue to work there?” Sure, I understand that it is difficult to go through the process of “of drug tests, questioners, and long interviews” as Gina H stated, but if the suffering conditions at Wal-Mart are THAT horrible, than why would it not be worth it? Barbara Ehrenreich was able to score multiple low-wage jobs during her research, although she did have extra money stored and may have had the advantage of being Caucasian. But why not apply for other jobs while suffering through working at Wal-Mart, and as soon as another offer comes, accept it and quit the job at Wal-Mart?
However, I do want to mention that I do feel an extreme sympathy for the low-wage workers across the world, maybe just not as much for the complaining Wal-Mart workers that chose (and are choosing) to work there. I want to mention how sad and wrong it is that the cost of a college education is so ridiculous. All throughout Nickel and Dimed, the situations and sufferings of all the people that Barbara encountered had (have) to go through kept frustrating me to no end. For example, Joan at Hearthside who “lives in a van parked behind a shopping center at night and showers in Tina’s motel room” made me extremely sorry for her, but also angry because all I could think was why don’t those workers like Joan get educated to become a skilled worker like Barbara so they earn more money, and thus have a better living arrangement, less suffering, and a better life (26)? But the problem is that those who are unskilled are stuck in the low-wage lifestyle because they do not have the money to go to college to become skilled, and if they have children just as their parents did, those children will have to live of low-wages and poor working conditions through their lives—it is just a never-ending cycle. How can we solve such a sad and horribly unfair issue?
One thing that really surprised me in Nickel and Dimed was that it seemed like the job she liked the least was being a maid. I know she did not really like any of the jobs, but chapter two appeared to be the one with the most complaints. From the way the Wal-Mart movie presented Wal-Mart I would have thought that chapter three would have been the worst in Ehrenreich's mind, since she experienced working there. I clean houses part time, not exactly like chapter two, but I know that it can be difficult. However, I would have thought that one of the other jobs would have been worse. Especially with the way the movie portrayed Wal-Mart.
Jackie S. mentioned that " Barbara Ehrenreich was able to score multiple low-wage jobs during her research, although she did have extra money stored and may have had the advantage of being Caucasian." I had the same question has she did, that why can't other low wage workers do the same as Ehrenreich? It seemed easy enough for Ehrenreich to find multiple jobs in all the cities she went to. So why does everyone else have trouble finding a job?
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Choice. Supposedly we all have it. An option, a decision. Control. But try explaining to a single Dad raising two daughters on his own what his choice is. Try telling him it’s okay to quit his minimum-wage job simply because he isn’t “happy” when his kids need food in their bellies and a roof over their head. Try to see the world through his eyes: you have no choice. You people are all assuming everyone has the freedom of choice. And you’re wrong. Walmart might not have the best working conditions-- the best pay, the best benefits-- but, when you’re bad off enough in life to where you NEED to work there to get by, it’s not so bad. Money isn’t free: it doesn’t grow on trees. So how can you think that jobs would?
In the worlds of a former Walmart worker herself, Barbara Ehrenreich writes “finding a job is a matter of being on the right place at the right time and flexible enough to take whatever is offered that day” (15) making it a matter of luck. A low/working-class family takes what they can get. They are flexible. And flexible means you do what you can, when you can, and however you can to make ends meet. If that means you work the graveyard shift at a 24 hour McDonalds to make rent, you do it. If that means picking up an extra shift even though it's on your kid's birthday so that you can actually buy him a gift this year, you do it. And if that means you suffer the "awful" conditions of Walmart to put food on the table, you do it. Try to stop looking at Walmart as a choice. It's not a choice. It's a sacrifice. Don't you think that if everyone actually had a choice we would all be doctors, and lawyers, and bankers who make hundreds of thousands of dollars a year? Don't you think the solitary father wants the best for his kids? For himself? Well they can't all be so lucky. If we were all doctors, who would sweep the floors? If we were all lawyers, who would serve us when we sit down for dinner at Lone Star? If we were all bankers, who would get us our coffee? Now I'm not saying a select few are doomed. You can break the cycle if you bust your ass. But don't you think there are people at Walmart with college degrees? Maybe there just isn't another opening. You can't make Walmart a choice. Jobs are just that: jobs. Not choices.
And on top of that, Walmart isn't even that bad. You all make it seem like some version of Hell. You forget that there is a great, big world outside of the comfy American standards of living. The are millions of people in third world countries who would walk into a Walmart and beg to work there. Think about it. We're so cushioned in our daily lives that we forget the conditions of the rest of the world. While some of us may want to wash our hands (Brittany H.), others might kiss the aisles.
Blog it.
This documentary made Wal-Mart seem like the worst possible business. The documentary portrayed Wal-Mart as being extremely self centered and like Jackie S said, there was “bias toward Wal-Mart because there are many other big corporations that are guilty of the same crimes.” Many large corporations like Wal-Mart, have caused smaller businesses to close down. These families have worked way too hard for them to just be shutdown by a major corporations like Wal-Mart. When small businesses get crushed by major businesses, all the effort that went into it goes to waste. Wal-Mart seems so greedy and power hungry that it doesn’t think about all the people it’s hurting. Like some of the employees from the documentary said, Wal-Mart doesn’t take into consideration all the sacrifices they have to make. All Wal-Mart cares about is the profit. Employees get stuck with low wages and healthcare they cannot afford. Breanna C makes a good point when she says, “Wal-mart seems to be the one thing that benefits from this cycle, when it already makes billions of dollars from cheap labor and underpaying employees.” Wal-Mart pushes people into poverty and they are stuck working at Wal-Mart, therefore they never break out of the cycle of poverty. If Wal-Mart is a billion dollar business, then why does it want its employees to resort to welfare instead of helping them? Wal-Mart doesn’t seems to want to spread the wealth around. According to the documentary, workers are cheated out of hours and out of wages. It‘s not fair that Wal-Mart takes advantage of these people and are not getting paid what they are supposed to be paid. Employees are supposed to be paid according to the amount of hours they work. Although Wal-Mart does offer jobs to millions of people, it doesn’t necessarily offer the best benefits.
I really like Savanah's point on how low class families take what they can get. While I still don't like Wal-Mart, I know what its like watching your mom come home from a part time cleaning job. This is also why I really liked Babara Eheinreichs take on her situations. She always kept in mind that she was taking these jobs and living situations with still a leg up on the rest of the people around her, "-while I am the imitation, the pallid, child-free pretender.(134)" She was really down to earth and while she adjusted well, she still was just one person, who had back up plans incase of emergencies. When she mentioned her rules and limits that she'd follow, such as," Finally I set some reassuring limits to whatever tribulations I might have to endure. . . If things ever got to the point where the next meal was in question. . .I would dig out my ATM card and cheat.(5)" I can't help but think of the emergency eject buttons in naval airplanes. As soon as things get to hot to handle, push that button and, mostly in the case of Barbara over a pilot, that person is safe!
The contrast between the book and the movie we were required to watch is pretty significant, yet they both hav underlying forms of bias. The High Cost of Low Prices has a biased view that has been discussed several times before, and Ehrenreich's book is only biased because it is her personal opinion of these situations and what it's like to live through them. None of us can ever really know the full story of the benefits and problems behind Wal-Mart because none of us, that I know of, are working there, especially with the added pressure of living on your own, which I don't think any of us, including myself, can quite comprehend that.
I liked what Laura W had to say about us not knowing anything about what Wal-Mart workers goes through in a daily routine. Except through a persons account of the events. Though also in a way Babara Eheinreich doesn't know what a normal Wal-Mart worker or other person who lives on minimum wage goes through emotionally in a normal life. This can be seen on page 5 in the book when she writes, "If things ever got to the point where the next meal was in question. . .I would dig out my ATM card and cheat." A normal person who lives on minimum wage does not have that type of luxury kept secret in their back pocket like Eheinreich does. There is no cheating for minimum wage workers and at some points, their next meal is in question. It's a hard life out there and one cannot truly experience someones life who works minimum wage unless they dump their credit cards, empty their bank accounts, and as they say, "When on Rome, do as the Romans do."
Gabriela D said, "Many large corporations like Wal-Mart, have caused smaller businesses to close down. These families have worked way too hard for them to just be shutdown by major corporations like Wal-Mart". This is true. But, do you think Wal-mart started off as a major multibillion franchise? I am sure Sam Walton, the creator of Wal-mart, did not start his company to stomp on the dreams of his competition. He probably started his company like his competitors: as a small mom and pop sort of place where the community could get affordable items. Franchise department stores, like Wal-mart and do not forget the others, do not turn into money oriented companies overnight. Say someone you knew had a small business and by chance of being in the right place and selling goods at the right price became a world known company. Would you feel these same feelings of dislike as we fell toward Wal-mart? Maybe, but most likely not. Does it take a movie to be made about the bad qualities in stores, like the one made for Wal-mart, to draw attention to all of the world renowned companies that also use cheap labor and under pay employees? During the jobs that Barbara Ehrenreich had, she could not afford to live on any of the pay checks she received. Do we dislike the companies and restaurants because the poor benefits and low wages of every single company? Of course not. Where then would we shop?
I’d like to start out with a little note to Webby; I would like the two hours of my life back. I understand the point the movie was trying to make, and surprisingly I mostly agree with it, but this movie was more painful to watch that Napoleon Dynamite, which by the way, I hate a whole lot. But I made it through; awake thank goodness, with one dominant impression of the movie—biased. Many of the comments that were made about Wal-Mart were true, but as many others have pointed out, this is a very one-sided film, and we cannot rely solely on it for our information.
From an objective point of view: Wal-Mart did not start out as the enormous enterprise that it is now. It started as a small business like any other shown in the movie. H&H Hardware, shown in the beginning of the film, had just as much opportunity and potential as Wal-Mart did. On the flip side, Wal-Mart has been allowed to grow too large. Competitive business is one thing but monopolization is quite another. The film compares Wal-Mart to standard oil, saying that if we took down Standard Oil then why can’t we take down Wal-Mart?
Like it or not Wal-Mart is not a monopoly, just a very strong business. While, sadly, many small town mom and pop shops have gone out of business because of it, many alternatives still exist. Other shopping choices include Targets and Super Targets, Walgreen’s, Rite Aide, and many others. The mere existence of these companies prevent Wal-Mart from becoming a monopoly.
In her post, Brittany H said that “Just because you do not shop at Wal-Mart does not mean that you are not still supporting what Wal-Mart does. The only way to avoid companies that abuse their employees and get their products from undesirable sources is to make your own food and clothes yourself.” This is a fairly cliché but true response to this. one person alone does not necessarily make a difference but if everyone has this attitude progress will never be made. One or two towns denying space for a Wal-Mart may not take down the company or evoke any change, hundreds of towns might.
It is important though to keep in mind the things that Wal-Mart does offer. Those low prices may help some of your families and though they may not be the best jobs, they provide jobs to hundreds of thousands of americans. Are those cute little mom and pop shops worth all of those jobs?
At first, I thought Barbara Ehrenreich was absolutely insane. To go from having everything: a PhD, a job as a writer, with the freedom to virtually create her own job for herself, to having nothing, even her writing kept separate from her work. But as I continued through the book, I realized that while I still thought her adventure was a crazy idea, I began to grow an immense amount of respect for her. Ehrenreich used her journalism skills to take on an assignment most reporters would be too afraid or selfish to do. I myself would not do it. Her findings have triggered a reaction in Americans that is hard to sustain. Americans are questioning their economy and their jobs.
(Ah! Savannah M beat me to it, but I also wanted to discuss the meaning of choice.)
Savannah M’s post did a wonderful job of presenting how most people do not have a choice where they work and what they earn; it is merely something they need to do. Another aspect of choice that we need to consider is the choice we have as consumers. I already knew about Wal-mart having people in other countries making their products for low wages before watching the movie. I definitely felt bad about it but it was not like I could do anything about it. My family shops at Wal-mart one or more times a week, spending almost $100 each time. We go there because the prices are lower than any other place, like Target or King Soopers. After watching the young girl from China being interviewed in the movie, however, I could not believe that I bought things made from the sweat, tears, and blood of people like myself. I immediately ran upstairs and told my parents all about it, hoping they would realize how terrible Wal-mart is and that we were supporting it. My dad’s answer shocked me. “Well you start stop buying things from them . . . how about you give us money to buy things from more expensive stores. We have no choice.” And I realized that he was right. As a family of six with only my dad working, it is pretty hard to afford anything. We have no choice but to get the best deals that we can. We have no choice but to buy stuff from Wal-mart. Yeah, they do pay people unfairly, but we do not have the money or power to change that. As many of my classmates have pointed out, it is not just Wal-mart; it is basically every store we shop at. What can we really do about it? We all say that we need to stop supporting them—stop buying stuff from them. We all say that it is wrong of them to pay people unfairly and that we need to make a change. But how? Brittany H’s response to my question is, “The only way to avoid companies that abuse their employees and get their products from undesirable sources is to make your own food and clothes yourself.” We all know that this is not possible. We really have no choice as consumers. Sure, we wish we did and we want to make a change, but there really is no way to do so, especially with the failing economy these days. Amber R summarizes my point when she says, “It is one thing to find the problems, but it is an entirely different thing to solve them.”
In addition to the choices we have as consumers, there are the choices of the people making the items for Wal-mart and other large companies. It may seem like the people in the movie suffering in China, Bangladesh, and Honduras have a choice whether or not they want to be working there, but in reality, they don’t. At first it was the Chinese girl’s choice to go work there. She wanted to earn some extra money and help her struggling parents—simple enough. But after working there, there was no choice. Her family needed the money and that was the only way she could have gotten some. Some may argue that she could have found a better job, like when Breanna C says, “Wouldn't it be easier to apply at different jobs?” Where? This does not just apply to her; it is the same for the thousands of Chinese workers there, as well as the workers in Bangladesh and Honduras. The women have to work, they need the money. This is exactly the same situation that the Americans working at Wal-mart are in, as Savannah M discussed. The many workers that Miss Barbara Ehrenreich meets, such as Gail, are in situations where they have no choice, as described in Nickel and Dimed. Gail has to live with her male roommate, even though it could possible lead to endangering herself, because there is no way she can afford rent without him. She is dependent on him, even though he could be dangerous. The other workers mentioned have no choice but to live in a trailer, or walk to work, or live with their mom.
I also recall the moment when I found out that Nike was having little kids from my country of Vietnam make their shoes for less than 50 cents a day, when Nikes are sold for up to 100 dollars. I was infuriated. My aunt, just like my dad had, brought up an interesting argument. She told me how the kids didn’t want to work and make shoes all day, but they had no choice. In most families, that was their only source of income because their parents are either injured or just old. And even though it wasn’t much money, it was much better than nothing at all. You see, you have to see it from their point of view. The money they make is the only thing keeping them alive, and if that means working all day in unbearable conditions, so be it. My family being from Vietnam and living in similar conditions understands this. You have to do what you have to do to support your family and to live, even if it means working hard, starving, being tired and sore. No matter what, you had to do it. Your life literally depended on that horrible job.
So before you all say that Wal-mart is terrible and the workers (American and foreign) are in terrible conditions and we have to change it all, think about choices, needs, and dependence that is involved.
I have to disagree with Breanna C W when she says “Do we dislike the companies and restaurants because the poor benefits and low wages of every single company? Of course not.” One of the policies of my household is the “no Wal-Mart” rule. I cannot go there simply because the workers are paid such a ridiculously low amount and the companies unionization rules are not as well hidden as they would like them to be. Wal-Mart is known nationwide as an unusually terrible place to have to work. Yes, many jobs do not pay their workers a whole lot, but with Wal-Mart’s long hours, low pay, and high healthcare rates, this is an issue known throughout America. And when Steph O W assumes “here are currently laws that mandate the freedom for unions to exist where they are wanted,” yes there are laws. But no, they are not followed. As Ehrenreich explains, workers have been fired from their jobs for trying to unionize. Technically workers were fired for little things like “time waste” and even “breaking the company rule against using profanity” (210). So if a worker wanted to get a group together to try to unionize Wal-Mart, they would, as soon as possible, be “bucked from the company” (210). I know this to be a fact because my dad is a union organizer. He has participated in rallies, negotiated, and done everything he can to try to unionize Wal-Mart. They are the only company my dad has worked with thus far (besides a small electrical company in the middle of nowhere) not to unionize. Not because the workers do not want higher wages and better benefits, but because they know the under-the-table ways of the Wal-Mart company. Now you have to understand I am not bashing Wal-Mart itself—I love a good deal. But I do not believe in the things the corporation stands for and will pay the extra dollar or two for a guiltless stomach.
I will not judge those who do choose to shop there because sometimes, Wal-Mart prices are all someone can afford. But the point I am trying to make is one that Ehrenreich brought up when saying “there’s something wrong when you’re not paid enough to buy a Wal-Mart shirt, a clearanced Wal-Mart shirt with a stain on it” (181). This is not about who shops at Wal-Mart. Who cares, we all want a low price. This is about who lives and works and starves at Wal-Mart. We cannot judge them and should not make up excuses for why they “choose” to work there. And as Dao T W brings up and Savannah M W says “You can't make Wal-Mart a choice. Jobs are just that: jobs. Not choices.”
The only thing we can do is try to make a statement. That is what my family tries to do by not shopping there. Maybe nobody will notice or even care about the employees of Wal-Mart, but at least we have done something to acknowledge the injustice they face.
Reading through the previous posts has made me think a great deal about the blame we place on Wal-Mart for it’s unfair treatment of workers and the way it monopolizes everyone, and I have to stop and wonder if it is really so bad as we think it is. As has been stated many times before, “Sam Walton, the creator of Wal-mart, did not start his company to stomp on the dreams of his competition. He probably started his company like his competitors: as a small mom and pop sort of place” (Breanna C). If this is true, how can we blame Wal-Mart for its success? It has seen opportunities and seized them. Yes it is taking advantage of people, but who isn’t? When Wal-Mart is given the decision between cheap labor or expensive labor of course thay are going to pick the cheaper one. Why? Because people are desperate and will take what they can get. It’s all buisness, nothing personal. So how can we sit here and condemn a buisness for being good at what it does? Yes it doesn’t offer the best benefeits and it’s employees are underpayed but at least they have jobs. As Savannah M stated, “a low/working-class family takes what they can get. They are flexible. And flexible means you do what you can, when you can, and however you can to make ends meet.” Sometimes that means working multiple jobs as many of the people, including Ehrenreich, had to do throughout “Nickel and Dimed.” People have to work through illnesses and exhaustion. One of the greatest examples that stands out to me from Ehreneich’s book is Holly, who seriously injures her ankle and insists on continuing her work. Now in cases like these, I certainly think Holly should have gone to the hospital and taken care of her ankle. My point is, that she was willing to work through the pain because she needed the money, and in situations that are not so drastic, people can suck it up for a while and deal with it. Of course there are people who have serious issues who need to be taken care of, but the majority of them are not in dire sitations that can render them unable to work.
I am not trying to sound harsh or unsympathetic for these people because I know in their situation I would probably feel the same way that they do. However, I must point out that there are many situations worse than their own that they could be in. Take the women in Bangladesh, for example, forced to work from eight in the morning to ten at night for less than seventeen cents an hour. What about the illegal immigrants who clean the stores at night? While these people are not exactly like us, they are still people who deserve the same rights as other employees. Why is it we are so worried about the employees we see protesting but ignore the ones behind the scenes?
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Lisa Mann brings up these other franchised businesses; ones such as Target, Walgreen’s, Rite – Aid. My question about these businesses would be is Wal-Mart really that much worse then them all? I am a shopper at Wal-Mart, in fact I just got back from there, and I have no problem admitting that. However, I also love Target and occasionally run into Walgreen’s for a thing or two. When I walk into these stores the employees look no less sick of their job than those employed at Wal-Mart as has been mention earlier. The reason Wal-Mart is considered so “disgusting” is because it has the most dirt uncovered on its secret inner workings. If some documentary came out about Target and how it gives its workers no time off and over works them then I am sure no one would go there either just to follow the trend. You cannot base shopping or not shopping somewhere on a bias documentary some one came up with to bash Wal-Mart. This would simply be unreasonable and frankly stupid. And to make a decision not to go somewhere because, as Brittany H said earlier in the posts, “[You] want to wash [your] hands as soon as possible” is ridiculous. These big businesses have to work and pay double to keep their places clean. Not to mention that it is not that places fault it is dirty. Customers just walk into stores and throw their trash on the ground. They don’t care who has to clean it up or what it makes the business look like. There are all these other businesses out there that have just as many customers as Wal-Mart and they probably have just as much junk. So why do we so easily condemn Wal-Wart and its affiliates? Perhaps it is because the society puts such a high emphasis on class and social status. It is true that the hunters, the red necks, the people in p.j.’s at two in the afternoon shop there, but have we ever thought that maybe they aren’t always in their pajamas and they are not always stomping around in the woods and they don’t always wear that belt buckle from the rodeo. They are just shopping like normal people at a store that meets their needs. I being a hunter, find that Wal-Mart is the only quick, reasonably priced place to find good gear for our hunting trips. We don’t shop there just because we are red necks or hunters. It just happens to be the place where we find what we need. That is most likely why Wal-Mart has the most junk uncovered about it because people who are not like those stereotypical “Wal-Mart shoppers” think that they can raise them selves up on some pedestal just because they don’t shop at Wal-Mart. I hunt and shop at Target but Target is not classified as the place where red necks shop. So maybe we should think about not automatically classifying these businesses just by who shops there.
I would just like to post an inspirational quote. At the end of Barbara Ehrenreichs' maid job in Maine, she asks one of her fellow cleanees about the people around them that are better off than they are, Lori responded " It motivates me and I don't feel the slightest resenment because, you know, it's my goal to get where they are. (118)" I'm not sure if the question in this blog is not so much treatment of employees at Wal-Mart, as much as how people striving to make a living are treated in their general profession. Money gives some people a sense of entitlement, and it really shows in these said "low class" jobs.
Like many are saying, Walmart started as a small business, it just had more success. But now my question is why can a smaller business provide some benefits and Walmart cannot? I do not think Walmart is a bad place to work, or shop for that matter, I honestly just think the employees deserve better. There are positives and negatives to Walmart and just like the movie, we all have our own opinions and how we feel about Walmart.
Many people in this blog seem to have a problem with saving money and shopping at Walmart. Cristina W W pointed out “perhaps it is because the society puts such a high emphasis on class and social status.” I agree. It is said… the wealthy shop at Target, Sam’s Club, Walgreens, and not so wealthy look for savings at Walmart. And to me there is also no problem with that. Maybe some people are embarrassed to say they shopped at Walmart, but if I were someone making minimum wage and needed to receive all the savings possible, I would be proud to shop at Walmart. They offer great deals. Cristina W W also said, “You cannot base shopping or not shopping somewhere on a bias documentary some one came up with to bash Wal-Mart.” Think about that.
Now I do not agree on how Walmart treats their employees. According to the movie “Walmart- The High Cost of Low Prices,” which is a bias point of view, Walmart employees do not receive overtime. They have to finish their task that they were assigned and then are allowed to go home. Whether it is on time or not. This doesn’t help at all with the other financial problems that these families are already having. The movie also stated that with all the money Walmart makes, it still won’t give health benefits and encourages employees to go on welfare instead of the company paying for it themselves. This makes no sense. Personally this is selfish to me. How could you not care about your employees well being and not care about if they even have a home, food every night, transportation, let alone health insurance. Walmart needs to step it up and give their employees what they deserve.
Amber R introduced the ides of business choices of Wal-Mart and, as an example, used: “When Wal-Mart is given the decision between cheap labor or expensive labor of course thay are going to pick the cheaper one.” It was earlier mentioned that, like any of the ma and pop shops that Wal-Mart has put out of business, Sam Walton likely started Wal-Mart as a small business. The growth of Wal-Mart to the corporate giant that it is today came from some smart business choices. I worked this summer in the accounting department of a construction company, and though different from a large, corporate run store, the business basics are similar. Where costs and expenses can be cut, cut them. Where there is a chance for profit, take it. This is exactly what Amber R’s example tells of, smart business choices. Now, I will say, that there comes a point when a line has to be drawn for the morals of human treatment—the treatment of the laborers overseas barely making any money, the lack of care towards employees. In Wal-Mart’s current state, we cannot see any reason they would continually need to make unnecessary expense cuts and profit gains (except that that is the goal of every business), but at one point in the history of Wal-Mart, these business decisions may have been made in order to help keep the doors open. Maybe the same choices would have kept open H&H Hardware or the local grocery store.
Dao T brings up the idea of “the choice we have as consumers.” Even if the prices vary, and that is the deciding factor, in Littleton we have many stores to choose from relatively close: Target, Wal-Mart, Walgreens, and Rite-Aid. However, not every town has the array of stores to choose from. Most of my dad’s family lives in small towns of Nebraska and the only store of this comparison near them, or within an hour of them, is Wal-Mart. I know that I have made quick trips to the store to pick up a last minute gift or some other last minute item. In Nebraska, there isn’t time to go an hour out of the way just for a last minute item, so the only option is Wal-Mart. Due to the small towns and equal demographics, most Nebraska towns cannot support more than one store of this kind, and consequently, the choice is lost.
When thinking about Wal-Mart not giving overtime to workers I'm at a crossroads. I believe that it is important for a worker to finish any task that he or she has started before he or she leaves the workplace. Unfinished work from one employee usually means more work for a different employee and in the instances where i have had to finish a task that one of my coworkers started before me but never finished I was never glad to do it. The other side to this argument is that Wal-Mart doesn't pay its employees when they do finish tasks in overtime. I know that at my work you are given some leeway as to when you have to sign in and out. Several times I have signed out early because there weren't any patrons. I have also signed out late because my required duties took longer than what normally constitutes my shift. Given that I stay within 15 or 20 minutes of my normal shift time’s no one cares much. But the main point is that I am paid for all the time I work including the extra time taken to finish a task. I believe that Wal-Mart should be rewarding its employees for being responsible and dedicated by paying them that overtime. Otherwise, they have no incentive to have those characteristics.
In fact, the whole practice of rewarding good employees seems to be non-existent at Wal-Mart’s portrayed in the documentary. The employees who do seem to succeed are those who can "work the system" and adopt morals parallel to those in use by existing Wal-Mart managers whether those are good or bad. As an employee I would want to be shown that the hard work that I am putting forth is acknowledged. And by rewarding an employee for his or her good work you create a want in other employees to get that reward thus building up a foundation of dedication in a company. By disregarding an employees good qualities, you are in essence promoting the bad qualities and then you end up with the situation at Wal-Mart where people merely work there and don't really care about their job beyond a source of money.
I personally have no problem with shopping at Wal-mart. I’m not saying that I like the way that they treat their employees and I do not support some of the things that Wal-mart does. I do shop there when I need something, but I also shop at Target and the Walgreens that is located practically next to my house. So what? Cristina W makes an excellent point when she says, “Perhaps it is because the society puts such a high emphasis on class and social status.” There is too much emphasis put on social status. Cristina also says, “It just happens to be the place where we find what we need”. I’m sure that this is the case with many other American families. Wal-mart is not just for the minimum wage workers or the hicks. People find just what they need, fast, easy and cheap. Social status has taken too big of a toll on our country and people should stop looking down on someone who has found what they need, even if the store doesn’t charge 200 dollars for a pair of pants. Steph O also brings up a good point when she says, “However, not every town has the array of stores to choose from”.
Laura W said, “I'm not sure if the question in this blog is not so much treatment of employees at Wal-Mart, as much as how people striving to make a living are treated in their general profession”. This was really displayed in Nickel and Dimed. I wasn’t really shocked about how Barbara Ehrenreich was treated by higher class people when she was working lower class jobs. Even when she told her co-workers at The Maids that she was really a writer, they do not seem to take her seriously at all. It said, “On my last afternoon, I try to explain who I am and why I’ve been working here to the women on my team for the day, a much more spirited group then Holy’s usual crew. My announcement attracts so little attention that I have to repeat it”118. This did surprise me. Her own co-workers did not even take her seriously. What kind of environment have they been in all of their lives?
After reading Nickel and Dimed I couldn’t help but feel tremendously spoiled and extremely blessed to be in such a well-off social class in which I don’t have to live a lifestyle that only concerns survival: a lifestyle without any meaning or personal pleasure. I don’t have to worry about keeping from starving, not being allowed to go the bathroom, about working long, tiresome hours with rude and callous bosses and with no equivalent reward but a pay of minimum wage, or that I don’t have to worry about the concern of not even being able to afford a house to live in. Maybe not necessarily in the movie Wal-Mart: The High Cost of Low Prices, but in Barbara’s Nickel and Dimed the purpose is definitely more focused generally on the issue of the “[living] on the wages available to the unskilled” and on the horrors of such types of jobs and not just of the horrors of Wal-Mart specifically. As practically everyone has agreed, the crimes of Wal-Mart are undeniably wrong, and those who are classified as the unskilled have no choice and are trapped in their situation in the low-wage lifestyle, but what has not really been discussed is a solution to this issue, Wal-Mart included.
Multiple times throughout Barbara’s book I found myself counting my blessings and deciding to change my ways. For example, I was shocked after reading about how hard it was to get by as a waitress and that “The seductive thing about waitressing is that you don’t have to wait for payday to feel a few bills in your pocket” (28), that the tip money can really be crucial to a full-time waiter or waitress and might even mean how much they get to eat at their next meal. I know that I’ve always hated tipping at restaurants and that after I figure out the twenty percent tip I probably round down if twenty percent of the bill includes some change. Now, I don’t think I’ll ever do that again; I may even pay the waiter or waitress a little more than a twenty percent tip the next time I eat out a at lower class restaurant. I do not ever want to be part of the annoying people like the “Visible Christians” group complaining about ridiculousness like a baked potato that is “too hard” and only leaving a “$1 tip on a $92 bill” (36). Even if money is tight at my house, I now know that it is never the worst case scenario and I could always spread my “wealth.” Also, I felt guilty for taking luxuries such as watching television for granted whereas Carlie and Barbara are turning the volume up all the way while they tediously scrub away at the hotel rooms and watching TV is a treat that “keeps [them] going” (43).
So although I am saying that we as individuals could help the issue of the unskilled workers by tipping them a little extra, not being an annoying customer, or by appreciating our incredible privileges, it would still not even make a somewhat significant change if all of us tried to do this. So, what CAN be done to solve this problem? Or is it unsolvable? Are unskilled workers trapped and doomed to forever work in ridiculously harsh conditions just for their survival?
I asked myself today: Why do I shop at Wal-mart? In my last post, my dad had answered that for me. He pointed out that we really have no choice. But I also got to thinking about Wal-mart’s convenience. Wal-mart, in fact, is very convenient for anyone. And that is what makes it so successful. In our busy lives today, we need to get things done quickly. With the economy, we need things cheap. Why blame Wal-mart for providing us with that convenience. Like Amber R said, “how can we blame Wal-Mart for its success? It has seen opportunities and seized them.” Wal-mart saw what the people needed or wanted and they gave that to us. So even though Wal-mart may be unfair to its workers and such, huge amounts of people go to Wal-mart for a reason—convenience being one of them. The smaller Wal-mart on Wadsworth is nothing compared to the Super Wal-mart on Bowles. The Super Wal-mart has basically double the amount of items to buy, a Tire and Lube area, an optical area, a McDonalds . . . and most other Super Wal-marts have a nail salon, a hair salon, a bank, other fast foods restaurants like Subway, and some even have a medical office. It makes sense to pack as much shops into a store as possible, that way every one can get what they need in one place. For instance, my sister can get her nails done while my little brother is getting his hair cut; my other sister can go eat lunch, while my dad is getting his tires changed; I can manage my bank account and while my mom is shopping for food. We can get everything done with one drive. Why drive to an optical store, then drive to a nail salon, then stop by the hair salon next door, and on the way home go to the bank, and oh wait! We need to go to King Soopers for food. My point here is that Wal-mart provides its customers with so many services, providing convenience for all members of the family. And not only this, everything is cheaper than other stores, which is like a double bonus! Lucy H even pointed out that, “People find just what they need, fast, easy and cheap.”
We also need to remember, however, that Wal-mart is not the only place doing this. Super Target is very similar. It has a Starbucks, an optical area, and other food services like a bakery and premade food that one can buy for easy eating. Sooner or later, the big stores are all going to pack their stores with other services as well.
(First off, Gina totally shops at Walmart! Her Dad just doesn‘t know about it. Lame.)
Barbara Ehrenreich gets on my nerves. Period. I am honestly appalled by her tone throughout this book. She is entirely nonchalant about this whole ordeal. To her, this is simply something she is “trying” not actually living.. But to the various characters she works with throughout the novel, it is not. Ehrenreich (also, I dislike spelling her name over, and over again) is treating this little “experiment” as a game. She is going at the completely un-realistically. The people who pay 50-65 dollars a night for a hotel room (such as Ehrenreich does in the Motel 6) don’t have “$1,000, plus some small bills crumpled in pockets.” (53). When they were cast into the real world, life didn’t stop and to let them whip out a magical ATM/get-out-of-jail-free card so that they wouldn‘t go hungry or without a place to sleep. It just doesn’t work like that. The whole reason this book originated, was from Ehrenreich herself saying that there should be more hard-core journalists doing it the old fashioned way. Hypocrite. The real way to do this wouldn’t be to go back to your very own home on the weekends to check E-mails or return phone-calls. No one else can do that, but she certainly can. She’s special. An exception to the real world if you will. “This should be exhilarating” says Ehrenreich, to “blow off all past relationships and routines, say bye-bye . . . and start all over again with not much more than a driver‘s license and a Social Security card.” Oh boy! Oh please. You can try and trick yourself all you want Miss Ehrenreich, but guess what, this isn’t fun. This isn’t one of your fancy little games of pretend, high school science experiment, or the board-game of Life. This is real. Real life. No colorful, spinning dial; no choice between the blue plastic car, or the red one; not even the choice between the “College Route“, or “Straight to Life.” Just life. Real Life.
I feel like Ehrenreich is naive enough to believe that the recently widowed mother of three has “$1,000, and some crumpled bills” (53) just stashed away somewhere. Or that the boy who busted his knee and blew his scholarship to college gets a re-do because he accidentally dropped the dice. I would even go as far as to say that Ehrenreich views herself as some sort of heroine. As she casually confesses her experiment to a co-worker she expects some remarkable response like “Oh wow! This is so neat! Do you mean to tell me that all this time I‘ve been standin‘ here wrappin‘ silverware next to a famous writer? Well cover me in gravy and call me a biscuit. Hey Earl! Did you know we‘ve been working with a real-live journalist all this time and . . . ” but instead, Ehrenreich receives a simple “So, does that mean you wont be working next Tuesday?” Or when she casually mentions how she gave Gail the key to good ol’ number 47. Casually. I, however, felt that she mentioned it in expectance of applause. She even feels compelled to inform us that she ALMOST stood up for George. Almost. Since when did almost doing something matter? “I almost did my homework Mr. Webb.” “Well okay then Savannah, almost is suddenly good enough for me. How odd. Here is full credit, and hell, I‘ll even throw in a bonus point!” “Thank you Mr. Webb, I knew I felt the Earth reverse its’ spinning last night!” Get real. Almost just doesn’t cut it. If you almost make rent, you still get kicked to the curb. If you almost made the team, you still don’t get to suit-up. And if you almost did something right, it’s still wrong. That, my friends, is life.
I’ve always believed that if you’re going to do something, do it right. Get your hands dirty, give it your best, and hope to God it’ll turn out just fine in the end. We see the subjects of other blogs doing just this. For example, Morgan Spurlock of “Super-Size Me” didn’t half-ass his experiment. He didn’t set ground rules to keep him safe. In fact, he didn’t even listen to the doctor (Doctor. Ph.D. Doctor.) who advised him to throw in the towel. Instead, we got some scared woman who isn’t even doing this correctly. She’s not experiencing hard-times. She’s not sleeping in cars, or living on tips. She’s cheating. We’re being cheated. So please, don’t be dumb enough to believe that Barbara Ehrenreich is accurately reporting on this. It is one thing to know that nothing you do can ruin your ACTUAL life, but it is another to risk it all and live like the people who work at Walmart, or diners, or hotels ACTUALLY do. Ehrenreich is a chicken.
It is starting to seem like, as Dao said, "Sooner or later, the big stores are all going to pack their stores with other services as well." It just seems like this is the way that our society functions, on a fast paced life style. People these days want everything in one place. They want food, electronics, medical, eye-care, and now even car care all in the same place. Wal-Mart has become a giant convenience store. Wal-Mart has become such a big national chain because it is so convenient to hard working families. This can be seen in Wal-Mart commercials which has a lady with all of these items on a table and she is explaining that "If you shop elsewhere this items can cost you X amount at another retail stores but if you buy all of these at Wal-Mart you can save X amount." Their commercials explain that you shouldn't run all over the place looking for all of your families needs, but to go to Wal-Mart and get them all in one place. So in a way we are responsible for the growth of Wal-Mart because we find it so convenient to go there and get everything we need.
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Wal-mart is becoming a giant convenience store and we can get everything that we need there. What worries me about this is that people working at Wal-mart could work in an area that they know nothing about! How do we know that we are receiving the best help and services that we can get? I mean sure, probably the eye, car, and hair care places all probably know what they’re doing, but how do we know that the employee in the electronics section actually knows anything about the digital camera that we want to buy? Or that the person in cosmetics really knows which foundation works the best? My sister used to work at Wal-mart. I asked her about the training that comes with the job and she told me that there is no training for any specific section, if that makes any sense. Basically the people that work in electronics stock the shelves so they know where everything is and can help the customers find what they need. The truth is, unless they have an interest in cameras, or have been really bored and gone through their section and read all of the labels (which I highly doubt), they know absolutely nothing about the one that you are trying to buy. They can tell you where to find it, but they cannot tell you about the shutter speed or the aperture of the camera. So, if you have gotten some "really good advice" about a product from a Wal-mart employee, let’s face it, chances are they have lied to you.
Rachel H asks “But now my question is why can a smaller business provide some benefits and Walmart cannot?” Exactly. If Wal-Mart is a billion dollar business, it should be able to provide its employees with more benefits, healthcare, and better working conditions. smaller businesses don’t offer as many jobs as Wal-Mart does, but they do offer more benefits and seem to be less selfish. But like Dao said, “You see, you have to see it from their point of view.” This is true. It is all about perspective. The movie depicted Wal-Mart has being the worst possible corporation there is. But the CEO of Wal-Mart, spoke very highly of the business saying it offered many careers and benefits. Because the movie is bias, it failed to portray some of the good aspects about Wal-Mart. Customers benefit from shopping at Wal -mart because they get better deals and they save more money. Because of Wal-Mart, many families who are not financially stable, are able to afford their groceries. And while many of the employees are having to work under unfair labor practices and live off of minimum wage, “at least they have jobs,” like Amber R said. Wal-Mart gives an opportunity to have a job to pretty much anybody. Many people desperately need a job to feed their family, and with big corporations like Wal-Mart, more jobs are available, thus more families are fed. Like others have stated, these people don’t have a choice because a job is a job. No one wants to work under these conditions but they cannot afford to lose their jobs because they have a family to support. And although workers in other countries must work under horrible conditions and hardly make enough money, just think of where they would be without that job. These people live in countries were jobs are very hard to find so they would probably not have a job at all. They would not be able to afford food, shelter, and everything that is essential to live.
I have a different opinion then Savannah M W. I agree with some of her points, but I do not agree that Barbara Ehrenreich is wrong in doing this experiment. Savannah M W said, “she is “trying” not actually living.” Barbara Ehrenreich is trying to live like this. She cannot just drop her whole life and actually live like this. She is not giving up everything for an experiment. She is trying to see what it would be like to live off of minimum wage to put herself in many peoples shoes today. There is no way she could “actually” live like this.
I would also like to comment on Lucy H W when she said, her sister told her “that there is no training for any specific section.” Her sister worked at Wal-Mart and had no training in any specific area. This brings up the movie, “Wal-Mart- The High Costs of Low Prices” when it said that a customer complained about how in the, “plumbing sections, nobody knows anything about plumbing.” Wal-Mart is not a “career” it is a job. Some people make it a career, but that a choice made by them. For instance, in Best Buy they sell CD‘s movies, refrigerators, washers, dryers, TV’s, computers, office equipment and the list can go on. Many of the employees are teenagers, at least at the ones I have gone to, and they obviously know nothing about refrigerators and other appliances like that. So when customers ask for assistance, many cannot offer much help. So when this customer complains about someone not knowing anything about plumbing, I feel like the customer is being too picky and harsh on the employee. If the employee was a master on a certain appliance or item, I guarantee they would have “mastered” on that one thing and have a better job. Period.
Savannah M called Ehrenreich a "hypocrite", "naive", and a "chicken". She also said "To her, this is simply something she is “trying” not actually living". Barbara Ehrenreich comes from a well off family, eventually resulting in her being well off. Going from these living conditions to that of a low class worker and actually "living" like one, is impossible. But, Ehrenreich did live in a trailer home. She did not go sneaking off to her home in the middle of the night and said she stayed in her trailer. She did live in the "Blue Haven" eating next to her bathroom, and slept in an unlocked small room in an area endangering her safety. While she cannot ever know what it is like to actually "be" a low class person does not mean she did not live and try, if only for an experiment. As for using her credit card as a "get-out-of-jail free card", if she has to money why not use it to keep herself from collapsing from hunger. I know it is not keeping to the strict rule of being a low class worker, but health comes before a book. Plus, I do not recall her ever even using her card, just using money to get her started. Lisa M said "Ehrenreich used her journalism skills to take on an assignment most reporters would be too afraid or selfish to do. I myself would not do it". Many people would not endanger themselves and work themselves to the bone for an insight at how life is at a low class job. She acknowledges that and is proud of herself.
One thing I did disagree with was her using welfare. While having money, the welfare would have gone to better use for those who actually need the extra help. While single working mothers take it with open arms, Ehrenreich criticizes the contents and did not even use it after going to that trouble and taking food from the mouths of the truly poor.
Breanna C criticizes I Ehrenreich, saying, “While single working mothers take [the emergency food aid] with open arms, Ehrenreich criticizes the contents and did not even use it after going to that trouble and taking food from the mouths of the truly poor.” However in reality, there wasn’t much she could do with “a box containing a bar of soap, dodorant, and a bunch of usless food items. . . .lots of candy and cookies and a one-pound can of ham, which, without a refrigerator, I would have to eat all in one sitting” (174). Yes, she certainly wasn’t looking at it from an optimistic angle, but in reality, she was not being supplied what was reasonable or logical for her. I recently read a book about two guys who spent six months homeless to experience and truly understand their conditions. At one point they were staying at the Denver Rescue Mission and the author described how they would receive donations that they would immediately take to the back dumpster because it was rotten or unusable. The problem was that people were donating, but what they were giving was unreasanable and didn’t make sense. In another book I read there was a man working with the homeless and they received a large donation box filled with microwavable popcorn. What are a bunch of homeless people going to do with microwave popcorn when they don’t have a home, let alone a microwave? The problem we are creating here is we assume that people in such horrible conditions will take anything, no questions asked. In reality, there is not much they can do with such impractical donations. Ehreneich does a good thing in the end of this story by donating the box to “another agency serving the poor” (174) so the food isn’t wasted. We make assummptions that they are ingrateful when really, they are just being reasonable.
Breanna C also brought me to another thought with her comment. She and many other bloggers have talked about giving back to the poor, but I must question how many of us actuallly do. Among the few who do, how often are the donations given as impractical as the moldy bread donated to the Denver Rescue Mission or the can of ham? We seem so concerned with making sure these people receive benefeits and help but we are not willing to help give them the quality substances they deserve. The empty carb diet of cookies and candy will not take care of people seeking food aid, but are we willing to give them what they really need? It is easy for us to sit, self righteous behind out computer screens and judge others for their actions, but what are we doing to help? At what point do we come in and say enough is enough and begin to make a change? So far all I see is a bunch of talk and no action. Talk to me when you are not only ready to see the problems, but to be the solution. It is time to stop waiting for someone else to do it, but to take matters into our own hands.
In response to Savannah M’s comments on Barbara Ehrenreich and her experiment, I have to back up Barbara and ask did you even read the first part of the book? It was basically a disclaimer. Savannah mentions all these comments from Ehrenreich and they reflect poorly on her. These comments however, are taken highly out of context. Yes she “ha[s] $1,000, plus some bills crumpled in pockets” but she says from the beginning, she “had no intention of starving (6)” or “sleeping in cars (6)”. This totally evens out all the times she did cheat. Her intentions were never to thrust herself into full fledged poverty and starve to death or live in her car. If this would have been her intention then she really could not have written this book. Who can afford to publish a book when your dead or have no money? She tells readers, “there was no reason to invent a whole new life” and she doesn’t so I don’t see the problem with her experiment. If she gives readers the heads up then we have no relevance to bash her and if we do we are taking her words highly out of context. She tells readers in the last paragraph of her intro, “I have no claims for the relevance of my experiences to anyone else’s, because there is nothing typical about my story.” By saying this she makes sure readers know that it is only an experiment and nothing more. She could never actually live in complete and total poverty and if she did that would not exactly be the best decision since she has the option not to. So even though she cannot tell us exactly how it feels to be poor, she gives her best to make people aware, if even just a little about the world around them. I enjoyed the book overall and I think it’s as close as any of us will get to living the ways those people do. I commend her for her efforts.
Breanna C says, “One thing I did disagree with was her using welfare. While having money, the welfare would have gone to better use for those who actually need the extra help.” She is completely right. I wrote my last essay for Webb’s class on entitlement and although she did not think she was entitled to the welfare, she takes it. I spoke about how it’s wasteful and wrong to take what you don’t really need. That could have been put to use to families who genuinely needed it. I think that is one time she should have cheated. Wasting is wrong especially when you have the ability to use other resources.
Breanna C W brings up a good point when she says “the welfare would have gone to better use for those who actually need the extra help.” But I think by going on welfare she really does get a taste of being so poor you can’t afford food. I do agree she should not have just returned the food, but what should she have done? She didn’t have a refrigerator to store the pound of ham and that was the only thing worth any sort of nutritional value. Everything else in there was sweets, chips, and the types of food that would last you an hour or so. This point really did make me think about what I personally give to charity. For me, and obviously many others, I will give a bag of Hershey kisses rather than a can of green beans because I figure that is what the saddened poor would rather have. I will spend a dollar on a bag of chips rather than a dollar on two cans of corn. What are we thinking?
Another point I would like to bring up is the idea of being invisible. Ehrenreich goes on about how when she was with “the Maids” everyone treated her as if she was the scum on their shoe. She explained how when she would go to a convince store, the clerk would avoid her completely. He probably didn’t have a much higher paying job than she did, but he felt as though he was better than her. I also find it to be very eye opening when she describes how when the maids clean someone’s house, the owners return home to find a house that miraculously “cleaned itself.” I wonder if we (the people who could possibly afford a maid once or twice) do that with other people, too. For example, how many times have we driven past that homeless guy, trying to avoid eye-contact? We know he is there, but forget within a few minutes of endless traffic. One day he could just pass out while holding up his sign and find no one there to help him. Would he go unnoticed just like Barbra’s fellow maid did?
Oh and yes, Savannah M W, I do shop at Wal-Mart on a few occasions, but I only participate in such activities because I like to make my dad angry, thank you very much.
Jackie S mentioned feeling sorry for the low-waged workers of the world. I’m about to say something that may com across as completely offensive, but I’d be willing to bet that others are thinking it and are just to worried about sounding rude to say it. As horrible as it is to see these people suffer, someone has to do those jobs. Someone has to clean the toilets, wash the tables, clean the hotel rooms, make the clothing, etc. It is sad to see the harsh lives that they lead, living from paycheck to paycheck, and it should make us feel priveledged. But they get something that you and I don’t. Most of us have our college education virtually handed to us on a silver platter, with sides of alcoholism and partying all night to wash it all down. These people have to work, they have to try, they have to put in a level of effort most of us deem impossible. They’re emotionally and physically stronger people for it too. They may not have a Wii to go home to at night, or even a home, but I bet most of them have a better sense of identity an need than anyone posting on this blog. It’s a high trade off, a high cost if you will, but at the end of our life the lack of nice things will not matter.
Amber R brought up the topic of Holly. Amber stated that Holly, in her mind, should have gone to the hospital after hurting her ankle. And she most certainly should not have kept working. This is the problem that Ehrenreich brings up through Holly. Not only can Holly, as well as many others like her, not take the time out of her day to go to the doctor, she cannot pay the doctor. This is why many uninsured people go to the ER for things every day that could easily be handled by a doctor. The ER is more convienent, and they know there are easier ways of dealing with costs. The repeated use of the ER is one of the most common complaints have against illegal immigrants, but it is actually a much broader range of people that do it.
This leads me to my next topic for discussion, rent. In the book, Ehrenreich talked about Gail having to move into the hotel for upwards of 40 to 60 dollars each day. Most likely, renting a place would have been far cheaper, but money was so tight that Gail did not even have the money to put down for the deposit. She only had enough money to pay on a day by day or week by week basis, even if it would cost her more in the end. This seems illogical to us, and it is sad when one’s living sittuations must defy the grounds of logic just to get by.
First off, I have most definitely read-- and very well comprehended-- the first section of the book thank you very much. And I refuse to take back anything I've said. Ever. I stand firm on my words, as they were placed with precision, and I fail to see the side of anybody who disagrees with me. Let me ask you this, how many of YOU have had to go through some of these things? (Remember to keep in mind what Mr. Webb said in our blog guidelines: be careful with what you say, because you never know the status of your classmates.) I ask this knowing for a fact that most-- I'm even willing to bet all (and I sincerely apologize if I am wrong on this)-- of the people who are disagreeing with me have not. So take it from someone who has: this book is offensive. I certainly know poverty-- from almost every angle you could imagine-- and I know what I'm talking about here. I don't necessarily believe that it was Ehrenreich's intent to offend,-- although most of the time our intentions are unclear-- but she did. Poverty isn’t a joke you guys. It’s not okay-- as Amber pointed out-- to use welfare when you don’t need it. It’s not “exhilarating” to be poor (and yes, I know she was only saying this to calm herself down in a scary neighborhood, but so what? Words carry weight, and her words are offensive to people who walk those streets daily. Also I found it to be extremely stereotypical of Ehrenreich to be afraid simply because she was in an impoverished neighborhood.). And it certainly isn’t something I think you guys are taking very seriously.
The people Ehrenreich worked with can’t just pack up and leave. They’re not trying to write a novel, they’re not under-cover rich people, and they can’t just go home if they fail. They have real bills to pay, real kids to feed, and real problems. Boo-hoo: Ehrenreich had to be poor for a while. Some people are poor their whole lives. I simply feel that she has treated this assignment poorly (no pun intended), and I feel the need for more compassion from her. The most compassionate pieces of Ehrenreich’s novel are the foot-noted statistics, and the actual reports of actual people’s lives. I don’t feel sympathy for Ehrenreich: she gets to go home. I feel sorry for the people who are in this for the long-haul: the true reporters. They are the ones who should be writing this novel, not some rich girl who decided to visit the trailer-park.
On a similar note, last night I was watching a show on Fox 31 called “Undercover Millionaires.” The point of the show is basically to re-enact Ehrenreich’s novel in a week. The millionaires “dress commonly” so as not to stand out, pack a suitcase full of their cheapest clothes, and set off to a town where they have never been. They are allotted a set amount of money (last night it was $109) that is supposed to pay their rent for the week, and groceries for a day or two. The millionaires can’t bring any toiletries with them, or other frivolous items, so the set cash also has to purchase the bare necessities. In every episode I’ve seen (about 8), the millionaires (usually a married couple) realize they don’t have enough money to make it in a single trip to the land-lord or the grocery-store. They must then go out and find jobs much like Ehrenreich did by not depending on their pre-consumed skills. The millionaires spend a week slumming, and are also supposed to keep an eye out for people in need. By the end of the week, they must give away at least $100,000 of their own money (though it usually adds up to a million) to the people they find deserving of a helping-hand.
Now you may think that “Undercover Millionaires” offends me just as much as Ehrenreich’s novel, but you’re wrong. In fact, I find this show inspiring. This show proves to me what Ehrenreich’s novel does not: rich people have hearts too. I’ve never felt that Ehrenreich truly cared about the people she was involved with throughout her report (maybe Gail). It was just a report. If she cared, she would have done some things different. For example, we all know that she established a safety net for herself before she even set foot in poverty. So why didn’t she risk her “job” and stand up for her pal George? It’s not like it would have affected her life, but I can only imagine how much it affected his. The millionaires, however, confess their true identities to the needy in the end, thank them for their lessons they have learned, and help them out financially. Now I’m not saying they’re heroes or anything, but to the people they have helped, they are referred to by names such as “saint,” “angel,” and “a miracle.” Now call me crazy, but can anyone show me a time where Ehrenreich fit any of these descriptions that I couldn't cancel-out in a second? Didn't think so.
I will remain offended by Ehrenreich. I will continue to argue her attitude towards this entire situation. And I will neglect to admire her.
One word: compassion. Get some.
My last blog is a plea to every student reading this blog.
You are blessed. You were born into a place in society in which you are pretty much guaranteed an education. Your parents care enough to allow you to take AP classes, and you go to a high school that helps its students immensely in the search for colleges. You are blessed because you can read and write, and that you have a school to begin with. Many people would die for what you have, and don’t give me some pity story about how horrible your life is because it probably isn’t.
In third world countries children dream of going to school. In the past few years, the Rocky Mountain District key club alone has built an entire school in Vietnam—with internet access. To these kids, the opportunity we have provided is worth everything they have. They sleep in cramped rooms, and often times don’t see their families for months at a time, but they’re getting the educatoin they so desire. So why is something does something that means so much to them mean so little to us.
Mr. Webb asked me today what the saddest part of Ehrenreich’s book was. The saddest part of the book is our reactions to it. The saddest part is the fact that most of us probably look at the people in these low paying jobs and say well why don’t they just go to college and get a good job in the first place. If it were only this easy, if only everyone could afford college, wouldn’t it be so simple? In short, yes it would. But its not. No issue is as shallow as we see it at first. Many of these people pray for the opportunity to further their educations and lives, but just simply don’t have the means to do it.
When we are the minority, when we as middle class American teens have the best opportunities thrown directly to us, a soft pitch at that, do we complain? Why in the world, when we are more priveledged and blessed than most of the world do we complain about blogs, annotating, essays, finals. We get an education. Most of us will get to go to college. College has become the norm in our school, you graduate and move on. But its not the norm everywhere, and it is an opportunity not to be taken for granted for.
So please, I beg you. Whether you choose the collge path or not, please be thankful for every teacher, every parent who has pushed you and offered you the education of a lifetime. We are so incredibly lucky and I hate to see it all being taken for granted and taken advantage of. Don’t waste the prescious gift that’s been given to you, please.
I can agree with Savannah in that Barbara does seem to take the easiest route and cheat her way through her experiment; multiple times I found myself writing in my annotations “That doesn’t seem fair for her assignment.” For example, Barbara makes her “own scientific contribution [to her experiment]” to buy the detox product for $30 just so that her urine test will not come out positive for drug use even though she was only taking Claritin-D (129). No other low-wage worker would be able to afford this kind of a detox to get out of a positive drug test, especially the ones who seriously have to worry about the results. However, I do completely see Breanna C’s point when she states that “health comes before a book” and that Barbara could not have actually risked her life because she was only doing the experiment to see what it is like trying to survive on minimum wage.
So I believe the point Ehrenreich is trying to convey is that even in the BEST of the worst conditions, the suffering from trying to survive “on the wages available to the unskilled” is unbearable and diminishing to any person (1). When Barbara began working at Wal-Mart, this harsh lifestyle started messing with her mind and health mentally because she started getting “Little nervous symptoms” and she began having serious mood swings which she called “Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde transformation[s]” (162, 165). Plus, because she gave detailed descriptions of the truly horrible situations that the others she encountered were struggling through in her book, or assignment, it was still able to serve as the intended eye-opener to show those who didn’t realize just how harsh the conditions actually are for the unskilled who are working ridiculous jobs for outrageously low-wages and maybe motivate some of us who are better off and “blessed” (Lisa M) to take some action and try solve such an awful issue.
As I stated in my last post, I believe that, if anything, we could all do our part to help out this issue by being more respectful to those who work in low-wage jobs. I know that as a small gesture, in attempt to maybe help out a FEW of the people in these situations, that I am going to always clean up after myself, and even others, when I go to a store like Wal-Mart or any other store for that matter because of the way Barbara described the amount of effort it took to have to keep cleaning up after the people who walk out of the clothing department with something and then decide, “Oh I don’t want this” and then just leave on the shelf of the produce aisle, or somewhere along those lines. We’ve all done it, but I never thought of it as any big deal. I always used to say “Well someone else can move it back; it’s their JOB too,” but now I see it in an entirely different way. And I never realized how lazy we can be when we try clothes on and then just leave them for someone else to put back—I know where I found them so I know where they should go back. It really could help someone out if each of us picked up after ourselves and wasn’t so selfish and ignorant to the hard work of the low-wage workers. Individuals really can make a difference, even if it is a small one. As unfortunate as it is, Lisa M is right when she admits that “someone has to do those jobs. Someone has to clean the toilets, wash the tables, clean the hotel rooms, make the clothing, etc.” So the least we could do to is “take the matter into our own hands” (Amber R) and try to at least help out the ones who have to do the dreadful jobs—like working at Wal-Mart.
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