The American middle class is slowly disappearing. Over the past few decades, the average American's ability to afford a living wage has deteriorated, with many citizens forced to hold down two or even three jobs at a time just to make ends meet. In the nonfiction book Nickeled and Dimed: On (Not) Getting by in America, writer Barbara Ehrenreich shows these difficulties by going undercover and living life through the low wages available to many Americans while attempting to live in three different cities in America . for a month each, with the goal of earning the next month's rent within that first month of work. In the course of his endeavors, he finds many difficulties with both his own situation and those of the numerous colleagues he meets along the way, showing the real-world events of social conflict theory, as well as through the class-based interactions between employees and employers. Work. and through immersion in the relationships between employees themselves. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay In Nickeled and Dimed, Ehrenreich has inserted herself into the world of the poor working citizen, establishing a low-rent living situation and working for low wages. wage labor and trying to find out if he can acquire the funds needed to live in each area. He lived in each area with the goal of finding the highest wage job he could maintain, the cheapest housing available, and not resorting to his previous work skills. She argued that the trial was something of an experiment, and while she just wanted to see if she could find a way to afford the rent of low-wage jobs, her experiences led to a strong sociological analysis of the effects of class systems on people . low-wage workers.Barbara Ehrenreich starts Nickeled and Dimed in the city of Key West, Florida, a city that was close to her home. Initially she rents a trailer to live in and finds work as a waitress in a small restaurant in the area. Ehrenreich finds that waitressing alone would not be enough to support herself and finds a second job as a waitress at a nearby hotel, but soon finds the job too physically demanding and leaves. After 2 weeks, he comes to the conclusion that he cannot afford to pay the rent and moves out. The second city where Ehrenreich lives is Portland, Maine. Here he can't find an apartment, but takes advantage of the abundance of weekly rental hotels, finding a cheap hotel room to live in for a month. She works two jobs again, one as a housekeeper on weekdays and another as a dietary aide in a nursing home on weekends. She can barely pay the monthly rent, but describes in detail the housekeepers' terrible working conditions. The third city Ehrenreich attempts to live in is Minneapolis, Minnesota. Here he is unable to find a place to live due to the few vacancies and ends up in a weekly motel with no lock on the door. He gets a job at the local Wal-Mart, but the pay is incredibly low and he can eat nothing but fast food to afford housing. Ehrenreich details the inner workings of Wal-Mart's treatment of employees and its failed attempts to get them to join a union and demand better treatment. This month, like the first, has faced failure to maintain housing. The greatest sociological theory shown in Nickeled and Dimed is conflict theory based on Marxism. Conflict theory states that between different groups and individuals who have different levels of power or wealth,the more powerful group will use that power to exploit weaker groups. In the case of low-wage workers in the various workplaces where Ehrenreich worked, they were consistently treated poorly by their employers, often humiliated and insulted, and otherwise despised. Florida's example of conflict theory at work was with one of Ehrenreich's colleagues, a Czech dishwasher who she refers to as George. George did not speak English very well and as a result there was a heavy language barrier. Within his first week on the job, some items are missing and George is accused of stealing from the company. Unfortunately, due to the language barrier, George is unable to plead his case and is consequently fired from the company. The cleanup job in Portland, Maine featured a humiliating training video, which represents conflict theory quite well. The video was made in such a way that it seems designed for young children. In one part, the man giving the instructions even says, “See, I'm the vacuum cleaner.” Having the video set up as if it were for children shows how the company views its employees, as unintelligent people, incapable of doing anything correctly without stupid instructions. Employees are treated with further disrespect as health issues have been largely ignored, only acknowledged with the simple remark to “work on it.” behavior of one of the employees during cleaning work. The employee, called Holly, refused to seek medical attention after injuring her ankle, despite being unable to walk without pain. Holly feared that if her situation prevented her from working even for a short time, she would lose her job and be unable to keep her miserable living situation intact. It later became apparent that Holly was pregnant; similarly, he refused to pay any kind of attention to it, for fear of losing his job altogether. It wasn't until Ehrenreich asked Holly to get medical attention that she was given a day off to see a doctor. Because of this level of fear, the upper class maintains its level of control over the lower class. Wal-Mart also demonstrated the concept of conflict theory with its poor treatment of employees. When Ehrenreich worked at Wal-Mart in Minneapolis, he found the job stressful and monotonous from the start of the interview. The interview featured a series of questions designed to make the prospective employee feel under severe scrutiny from the start, including many moral dilemmas such as dealing with theft and dishonesty of colleagues. This phase was immediately followed by a drug test, which showed an implicit distrust of any potential employees and a belief that drugs are the norm among candidates. These practices have shown how employers at middle- and upper-class companies automatically assume the worst about lower-class employees and work to tear them down. The orientation process involved eight hours of boring, repetitive teaching about Wal-Mart's ideologies and propaganda, much of it emphasizing how fantastic Wal-Mart is as a company. Once actually employed at Wal-Mart, Ehrenreich discovered that employees would continue to be criticized for every little problem that arose. For example, one of the managers, named Howard, hounded any employee who started speaking up, accusing them of “time theft,” or not actively working during office hours. Furthermore, Ehrenreich brings out a competitive nature that ultimately proves unhealthy. With lower class employees put in the position of feeling of.