What is the authors argument in Nickel and Dime?

I may be totally off base here, but I believe in the end the true argument is that people subsisting on government money do not live off the generosity of others (federal aid), but that we are in fact the ones living off of their generosity because of their sacrifices (working in a low paying job because there's nothing else available.

If anyone else has a better take on this feel free....... and I'll remove the above.