Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich
Published 2001 · 80,000 words · about 5 hours at an average pace · Journalism & Reportage, Nonfiction, Politics & Society
How hard is Nickel and Dimed to read?
Nickel and Dimed scores 20 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 28 out of 100
- Clear, journalistic prose. No jargon.
- Sentence structure: 28 out of 100
- Abstraction: 25 out of 100
- Concrete, experiential reporting. Analysis is embedded in narrative.
- Information density: 42 out of 100
- Rich with specific wages, costs, working conditions, and personal observation.
- Narrative indirection: 100 out of 100
- Direct, first-person reporting.
- Symbolic density: 100 out of 100
- Ehrenreich's experiences represent millions. Otherwise literal journalism.
- Ironic distance: 25 out of 100
- Ehrenreich's acerbic wit provides sharp commentary.
- Resolution withholding: 15 out of 100
- The experiment ends, but the problem doesn't. No resolution offered.
- Structural complexity: 15 out of 100
- Three chapters, each covering one job. Simple, effective structure.
How Nickel and Dimed is regarded
Nickel and Dimed holds a literary regard score of 49 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.