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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. At the ____________, the interviewer Barbara meets warns her about labor organizers, to avoid them.
(a) Grocery store
(b) Factory
(c) Wal-Mart
(d) Drugstore

2. Barbara feels to truly replicate the experience of a minimum wage worker, she would need to have a few __________ in tow too.
(a) Relatives
(b) Boyfriends
(c) Bill collectors
(d) Children

3. Many of the businesses in town seem to place ads in the paper ____________ so as to always have applicants.
(a) Once in a while
(b) On Sundays
(c) Constantly
(d) On Mondays

4. Barbara realizes that her use of a car is different as many minimum wage workers have to use _________ to get around.
(a) Streets
(b) Friends
(c) Buses
(d) Their legs

5. The manager, ________, yells at Barbara for a confused breakfast and a yuppie customer complains too.
(a) Stu
(b) Millie
(c) George
(d) Joy

6. For what magazine does the author of "Nickel and Dimed" work when she is beginning her assignment?
(a) New England Journal
(b) New Yorker
(c) NY Gazette
(d) New York Times

7. The author also doesn't want to live in an _____________ building when she is off on her assignment.
(a) Inferior
(b) Apartment
(c) Ill built
(d) Illuminated

8. What does Ehrenreich discover about her uniform when she is heading over to her second job?
(a) It is at home
(b) It is stained
(c) It is too small
(d) It is ripped

9. Barbara admits that at the end of the project, she did break down and ____________, stealthily, though, and never within hearing of management.
(a) Rant
(b) Cry
(c) Admit her assignment
(d) Laugh

10. Barbara certainly does not want to do hard ________ labor when she is working at her new jobs.
(a) Mental
(b) Physical
(c) Slave
(d) Outside

11. What is the 'dream job' that Barbara lands in addition to her restaurant job, taking on both when in Florida?
(a) Factory work
(b) Office work
(c) Librarian
(d) Housekeeping

12. Barbara notes that her sister constantly complained about the hopelessness of being a ____________.
(a) Waitress
(b) Woman
(c) Minimum wage worker
(d) Wage slave

13. Barbara does not want to live a life of _________ or discomfort when it comes to this new assignment.
(a) Pain
(b) Inauthenticity
(c) Poverty
(d) Risk

14. Barbara began to realize that the only thing that made her special and separate from others at her workplace was her lack of __________.
(a) Ripped clothing
(b) Driver's license
(c) Experience
(d) Debt

15. Barbara ruled out areas like LA and New York as the working class consists mainly of people of _______ and she might look out of place.
(a) Color
(b) Class
(c) Poverty
(d) Higher education

Short Answer Questions

1. Having spend her life with ____________ struggling people, the author is not happy about getting the assignment.

2. As Barbara downs coffee who does she notice is looking haggard when she shows up for her next job?

3. __________ is a city in which Barbara is afraid she might be recognized, so she looks for work in a nearby city.

4. Barbara notes that she made a rule that she had to work hard at her jobs to keep them, not go off on ________ rants or sneak off to read novels in the ladies' room.

5. Barbara will take the ____________ paying minimum wage job she can find when she's off on assignment.

(see the answer keys)

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