Free eBooks Hand To Mouth: Living In Bootstrap America Available To Downloads
The real-life Nickel and Dimed—the author of the wildly popular “Poverty Thoughts” essay tells what it’s like to be working poor in America. ONE OF THE FIVE MOST IMPORTANT BOOKS OF THE YEAR--Esquire “DEVASTATINGLY SMART AND FUNNY. I am the author of Nickel and Dimed, which tells the story of my own brief attempt, as a semi-undercover journalist, to survive on low-wage retail and service jobs. TIRADO IS THE REAL THING.”—Barbara Ehrenreich, from the Foreword As the haves and have-nots grow more separate and unequal in America, the working poor don’t get heard from much. Now they have a voice—and it’s forthright, funny, and just a little bit furious. Here, Linda Tirado tells what it’s like, day after day, to work, eat, shop, raise kids, and keep a roof over your head without enough money. She also answers questions often asked about those who live on or near minimum wage: Why don’t they get better jobs? Why don’t they make better choices? Why do they smoke cigarettes and have ugly lawns? Why don’t they borrow from their parents? Enlightening and entertaining, Hand to Mouth opens up a new and much-needed dialogue between the people who just don’t have it and the people who just don’t get it.
Paperback: 240 pages
Publisher: Berkley; Reprint edition (September 1, 2015)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0425277976
ISBN-13: 978-0425277973
Product Dimensions: 5.4 x 0.6 x 8.2 inches
Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (338 customer reviews)
Best Sellers Rank: #51,650 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #56 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Poverty #94 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Sociology > Class #2128 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Memoirs
Why do poor people do things that seem so self-destructive? When 32-year-old Linda Tirado, a college student, wife and working mother of two, responded to this question on an online discussion board in the fall of 2013, her stirring personal post entitled “Why I Make Terrible Decisions, or, poverty thoughts," went viral and sparked heated community discussions about poor people’s individual and collective work ethics, motivations, food choices, childrearing, health practices, mental states and even sex lives.Many supporters, including Barbara Ehrenreich, author of NICKEL AND DIMED: On (Not) Getting By in America, "felt an enormous wave of vindication" upon reading Tirado's words. And in the foreword of HAND TO MOUTH: Living in Bootstrap America, Ehrenreich praises Tirado for openly and unabashedly sharing the daily realities of her life as a low-wage worker and demonstrating "that poverty is not a ‘culture’ or a character defect; it is a shortage of money.”"I am doing what I can to walk you through what it is to be poor," writes Tirado. She recalls in her mid-20s holding three jobs as a bartender (a boss offered female workers better shifts if they agreed to service him sexually), waitress (the baseline hourly wage for waiting tables was $2.13, and new staff got the slower shifts) and voter registration canvasser. The soul-killing experience, Tirado laments, "nearly killed me, and I still didn't break twenty grand that year."Tirado describes the fundamental lack of job security and basic benefits in the food service industry, such as paid sick leave and health insurance. "As a general manager for a chain restaurant, I got eight days of maternity leave after I had my second daughter. Unpaid.
First, let me say what’s great about this book. There are some funny, sharp, wonderfully expressed insights in this book – the author has a comedian’s natural sense of timing. The writing flows well, so the story is easily read in a day. Tirado tells us about poverty in a way that many of us have experienced it so, in that sense, the story “rings true”. Tirado has a “young” voice – most of her narrative occurs when she was in her twenties – this may be why her account focuses on a struggle with authority that many older women in similar circumstances wouldn’t put as much emphasis on. The details about cashing checks at Wal-Mart, smoking as an antidote to hunger, losing a vehicle because you can’t afford to spring it from the impound lot, prepaid payroll cards, the decade-or-more wait for Section 8 housing, the inability to ever afford a vacation, and the complete and utter lack of affordable dental care despite occasional, large-scale, dental clinics for the poor are all accurate.There were a lot of critical complaints about the last chapter titled, “An Open Letter to Rich People” – I couldn’t understand why. Any reader with sense could see the tone was “tongue-in-cheek” and supposed to be funny – the only reader who could possibly be offended is a sensitive, sheltered reader who mistakenly thought the author had declared “open season” on middle-class folks – I certainly didn’t read it that way.The biggest flaw of this book is that all dates were obscured or left out, so it was impossible to determine a time-frame for an account that is essentially a memoir. A more sensitive editor would have been immediately alert to the issues of credibility that this would raise.
Hand to Mouth: Living in Bootstrap America Step By Step Bootstrap 3: A Quick Guide to Responsive Web Development Using Bootstrap 3 Unraveling Bootstrap 3.3 (With Over 100 Complete Samples): The book to Learn Bootstrap (v3.3) from! (Unraveling Series 2) Home Remedies for Ulcers (ulcer, stomach ulcer, peptic ulcer, ulcer symptoms, stomach ulcer symptoms, ulcer treatment, mouth ulcer, mouth ulcers, cold sore, cold sore remedies, cold sores) The DIY Wedding: How to Bootstrap Your Way to the Perfect Wedding (Wedding Dress, Wedding Planning, Invitations, Centrepieces, Favours) Living Off The Grid And Loving It: 40 Creative Ways To Living A Stress Free And Self-Sustaining Lifestyle (Simple Living, Off Grid Living, Off The Grid Homes, DIY Survival Guide, Prepping & Survival) Caillou: No More Diapers (Hand in Hand) Hand-in-Hand: Ceramics, Mosaics, Tapestries, and Wood Carvings by the California Mid-Century Designers Evelyn and Jerome Ackerman Knife Fighting, Knife Throwing for Combat (Special Forces/Ranger-Udt/Seal Hand-To-Hand Combat/Special W) The games of drawing room hockey, tether ball, hand tennis, garden hockey, volley ball, basket goal, lawn hockey, wicket polo, hand polo, golf croquet, clock golf, laws of badminton Real Goods Solar Living Sourcebook: Your Complete Guide to Living beyond the Grid with Renewable Energy Technologies and Sustainable Living Tiny Houses : Beginners Guide: Tiny House Living On A Budget, Building Plans For A Tiny House, Enjoy Woodworking, Living Mortgage Free And Sustainably ... Design,construction,country living) The Hand-Sculpted House: A Practical and Philosophical Guide to Building a Cob Cottage: The Real Goods Solar Living Book Thai Cooking: Cook Easy And Healthy Thai Food At Home With Mouth Watering Thai Recipes Cookbook Mexican Cooking: Enjoy The Top 50 Best & Super Delicious Mexican Food At Home With Mouth Water Mexican Recipes Cookbook Daniel Fast Smoothies: Scrumptious and Nutritious Blend of Flavors That Make Up a Mouth Watering Array of Smoothie Beverages Easy Chicken Recipes Cookbook: Top 50 Mouth-Watering, Easy to Make Recipes Including Grilled Chicken Recipes, Baked Chicken Recipes, Chicken Soup Recipes, Chicken Thigh Recipes, and Many More! Cast Iron Cookbook: 25 Mouth-Watering Recipes Your Family and Friends Can Try Out At Home (Cookbook for Busy People) Pressure Cooker Cookbook: 3 In 1 Box Set - 310 Mouth-Watering and Healthy Pressure Cooker Recipes for Stove Top and Electric Pressure Cookers (Pressure Cooker, Pressure Cooker Recipes) Overnight Oat Cookbook: The Ultimate Recipe Book for Making Healthy, Mouth Watering Oats While You Sleep
