She also co-wrote a book on student activism, “Long March, Short Spring,” with her then-husband, John Ehrenreich. The New York Times bestseller, and one of the most talked about books of the year, Nickel and Dimed has already become a classic of undercover reportage.

Starting in the 1970s, she worked as a teacher and researchers and became increasingly active in the feminist movement, from writing pamphlets to appearing at conferences around the country. By BARBARA EHRENREICH Metropolitan Books Read the Review Serving in Florida Mostly out of laziness, I decide to start my low-wage life in the town nearest to where I actually live, Key West. As a little girl, she told The New York Times in 1993, I would go to. She studied physics as an undergraduate at Reed College, and received a PhD in immunology at Rockefeller University. Barbara Ehrenreich was an American author and political activist.

She was born Barbara Alexander in Butte, Montana, and raised in a household of union supporters, where family rules included “never cross a picket line and never vote Republican.” “She was never much for thoughts and prayers, but you can honor her memory by loving one another, and by fighting like hell.” Edited by MJ Davis Lin, Michael Benoist and Lisa Chow. In the Clinton era, Barbara organized feminists to fight his austere brand of welfare reformwhich forced women into work that did not pay a living wage. “She was, she made clear, ready to go,” Ben Ehrenreich tweeted Friday. Produced by Carlos Prieto, Nina Feldman, Rob Szypko, Stella Tan and Alex Stern. NEW YORK - Barbara Ehrenreich, the author, activist and self-described “myth buster” who in such notable works as “Nickel and Dimed” and “Bait and Switch” challenged conventional thinking about class, religion and the very idea of an American dream, has died at age 81.Įhrenreich died Thursday morning in Alexandria, Virginia, according to her son, the author and journalist Ben Ehrenreich.

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