Serving in Florida: Excerpt from Nickel and Dimed
Passage Summary:
In "Serving in Florida: Excerpt from Nickel and Dimed," author Barbara Ehrenreich talks about the first steps and early struggles in her social experiment.
When and How to Pair:
Introduce this text after reading Chapter 27, in order to draw contemporary and historical comparisons on employment and wages in the United States. Pair “Serving in Florida: Excerpt from Nickel and Dimed” with The Grapes of Wrath: Chapter 27 and ask students to compare the Joad family’s search for fair living and working conditions with Ehrenreich’s experiment as a modern minimum-wage worker. How does the Joad family’s experiences support Ehrenreich’s argument that the working class are undervalued?