Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: Know Them Well (Javier Auyero) -- 1. Austin, Texas, in Sociohistorical Context (Maggie Tate) -- 2. Santos: The Gold Hunter (Jacinto Cuvi) -- 3. Clarissa: "A Woman Who Fell on Hard Times" (Kristine Kilanski) -- 4. Inés: Discipline, Surveillance, and Mothering in the Margins (Jessica Dunning-Lozano) -- 5. Chip: The Cost(s) of Chasing the American Dream (Eric Enrique Borja) -- 6. Raven: "The Difference between a Cocktail Waitress and a Stripper? Two Weeks" (Caitlyn Collins) -- 7. Kumar: Driving in the Nighttime (Katherine Jensen) -- 8. Ethan: A Product of the Service Industry (Katherine Sobering) -- 9. Keith: A Musician at the Margins (Amias Maldonado) -- 10. Xiomara: Working toward Home (Jennifer Scott) -- 11. Ella: Fighting to Save a Few (Pamela Neumann) -- 12. Manuel: The Luxury of Defending Yourself (Marcos Pérez) -- Afterword: Plumbing the Social Underbelly of the Dual City (Loïc Wacquant).