Minimum Wage Job Exposed In Nickel And Dimed By Barbara Ehrenreich

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The invisible workforce consists of the low-wage workers that face harsh working conditions, a few or no benefits, and long hours of labor that exceed the regular business week. Barbara Ehrenreich, narrates her experience of entering the service workforce, in the book Nickel and Dimed. She proves that getting by in America working a minimum wage job is impossible. Although, the book was written in the 1990’s, the conditions in which minimum wage workers lived still prevail today. Minimum wage no longer serves its original purpose of providing a living wage for the invisible workforce. The Fair Labor Standards Act was established in 1938 during the Great Depression; because Roosevelt felt that an action need to be taken about the long hours and starvation wages.Before the FLSA , “it was common for workers to experience cruel work environments.” (Dugger 1) President Roosevelt was handed a message by a girl stating “We have been working in a sewing factory... and up to a few months ago we were getting our minimum pay of $11 a week.... Today the 200 of us girls have been cut down to $4 and $5 and $6 a week.” (Dugger 2). Consequently, Roosevelt worked to pass a legislation that would protect Americas laborers. …show more content…

According to the established FLSA, non-exempt employees working on an hourly basis should make a living wage working the forty hour work week. Currently,minimum wage is not equal to the living wage. An action needs to be taken now, before the middle class completely disappears. One percent of the populations owns more of the wealth than the other ninety-nine percent.If the working class is not able to improve its current situation only two social classes will exist. America will be divided by a high well paid class and a low class with a minimum wage

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