100 Books Like We Are Poor but So Many

I met Matthew Desmond before he became one of the youngest Professors with his own center at Princeton University. He was visiting London, had just published his first book, and was still finishing the research for this book.

Desmond did an enormous amount of field research; he spent months living in a trailer park, on top of thousands of hours in archives and courtrooms where eviction cases are decided. The result is the best book I have ever read about poverty.

What happens when ‘normal people’ get evicted? Desmond’s story is rich and personal, and that is what we need: we need to understand the lives of poor people better in order to finally decide that we must change the systems that put them there. 

Drawing on her first-hand experience of living in a shantytown in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Perlman powerfully upends many existing myths about the urban poor as marginal in this classic work.

This book, which inspired me to look beyond the economic models at how people actually live, shows how shantytown dwellers are integrated into society, but in a way that exploits and oppresses them economically and politically.

They are not socially and culturally marginal, but rather they are stigmatized and excluded from a closed social system that is radically unequal.

They are socially well-organized and cohesive; they aspire to educate their children and improve the quality of their homes; they work hard and take pride in a job well done. They are aware of and involved in those aspects of politics that affect their lives. 

In this riveting account, Agbiboa dispels the myth that corruption is a culturally accepted norm in Nigeria.

He spent months behind the wheel as a minibus conductor in the informal settlements of Lagos, Nigeria, and experienced first-hand the stark realities of the corrupt interactions between drivers, police, and members of the transport workers union.

Nigerians reject, and simultaneously have little choice, but to participate in the petty corruption that arises from the systematic, violent, and exploitative relationship between the state and union on the one hand, and transport operators and passengers on the other.

Agbiboa shows that binary understandings of formality/informality, public/private, and legal/illegal derived from Western thought do not adequately capture the way that petty corruption is embedded in the state and is driven by elite corruption.

This resonated strongly with my research on the informal economy in Tanzania.

Veteran journalist Neuwirth challenges conventional economic thinking when he explores the global dimensions of the informal economy, worth trillions, that operates all around us yet is hidden from view.

His eye-opening depictions from Brazil to Nigeria and China ring true to anyone familiar with this economy that has its own unwritten rules, provides economic opportunities to half the world’s population, offers consumers with affordable products, and recycles waste.

He takes seriously the aspirations of the participants in this economy who interface with the formal economy, yet do not necessarily aspire to work in it.

The author (Ross) spent years in the vicinity of Disney World, focusing on residents in the hidden encampments and run-down motels where Disney employees and other economic unfortunates live. I was captivated by his descriptions of strip malls, convenience stores, and abject poverty in close proximity to luxury hotels and Disney attractions—places where owning a home is an unattainable dream.

What this book does more than any other I’ve read is sound the alarm about the predatory nature of hedge funds and private equity firms buying up real estate throughout the United States. Housing affordability becomes even more distant as the gap between the haves and have-nots grows ever larger.

I loved this book, even as it made me so angry at the way this country treats workers who are, in fact, essential. I read it years ago, before I met and got to know its author, and was immediately swept up by its remarkable but very simple premise: entering incognito into low-wage working life in communities across the country—and writing about it.

I was fascinated by this raw, behind-the-scenes look at the ugly underside of restaurants, hotels, and big box stores, among other staples of American life. I was engaged by the author’s authentic and distinctive voice. I felt like I was listening to a friend recount, in detail, her visit to a strange yet also familiar land. 

I read this book when it was first published when working low-wage ‘regular’ jobs was something I feared. I had been poor for so long and worked low-wage regular jobs before and through 9 years of college and after until I became an escort. As much as being an escort was shamed, it was nothing compared to the shame of not being able to survive with two low-wage jobs that eat up all your time, your choices, and your health. Then here was this powerful, insightful book.

The author is a journalist who goes underground, takes these jobs, and tries to survive. What is revealed are the lives of so much of the population in America that are working this way. I read this book in one day. Once you see it and have felt it, it’s impossible not to see it and want better for all of us.

I remember reading this book on a camping trip. It’s a story of the nomad movement, particularly focused on low-income adults who are forced to live in their cars, campers, and RVs.

I fell in love with the grit and resilience of the people who often face difficult circumstances but embrace the minimalism, connection to the natural world, and community they build on the road out in wild places in the desert Southwest.

You might be familiar with the movie that came out a few years ago, but I highly recommend the book, which I couldn’t put down.

This book by sociologist Newman provides an ideal mix of statistical data with in-depth interviews with a group of low-wage workers, describing how their employment and life conditions changed over time.

We come to know these people, to understand what it is like to be employed in a low-wage job, and how it is possible but not easy for them to move up to better-paying jobs.

This book takes on class, gender, and addiction, plus a host of other contemporary issues facing rural America and the nation—and Smarsh still manages to craft a compelling, human memoir.

This book might be the antidote to all the easy, anodyne, partisan conclusions the talking heads offer about rural America. As someone who grew up in rural America but now lives in a small city on the West Coast, I felt challenged reading this memoir.

Smarsh is the best kind of rabble-rouser; she’s telling it straight no matter who is listening.