Barbara Ehrenreich Gives Summary of Bait and Switch

In this talk given at Books Inc., author Barbara Ehrenreich discusses her book Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream which examines the difficulty of middle-aged professionals trying to get white-collar jobs in corporate America. In her bestselling 2001 book Nickel and Dimed she went undercover to expose the hardships of the working poor. In Bait and Switch she goes undercover in the corporate world to explore white-collar unemployment. In this talk Ehrenreich uses her characteristic wit to describe the many curious ways that corporations have used to justify their layoffs and to blame middle class workers for their own unemployment. Towards the end she mentions her non-profit group United Professionals which she formed in 2006 to organize activism amongst white-collar workers who are unemployed. This talk is available on streaming video from FORA.tv.

Barbara Ehrenreich: Bait and Switch

This engrossing piece of undercover reportage has been a fixture on the New York Times best-seller list since its publication. With nearly a million copies in print, Nickel and Dimed is a modern classic that deftly portrays the plight of America's working-class poor.

A successful author, Barbara Ehrenreich decides to see if she can scratch out a comfortable living in a blue-collar America obsessed with welfare "reform". Her first job is waitressing, which pulls in a measly $2.43 an hour plus tips. She moves around the country, trying her hand as a maid, a nursing home assistant, and a Wal-Mart salesperson. What she discovers is a culture of desperation, where workers take multiple thankless jobs just to keep a roof overhead.

Often humorous and always illuminating, Nickel and Dimed is a remarkable expose of the ugly flip side of the American dream.

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Listen to a free sample of: Nickel and Dimed

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