One in 20 people in Britain lives on the minimum wage. Most of them are on zero-hours contracts working in dingy warehouses (euphemistically termed “fulfilment centres”), private care homes, call centres or as Uber drivers. Like a 21st-century George Orwell, Bloodworth has gone undercover, experiencing for himself the precarious employment conditions of the “new working class” in towns across Britain, to reveal the dark side of the modern economy.

At Amazon he walked 10 miles a day in a vast warehouse where workers were treated “as if we were convicts” and scarcely had time for toilet breaks. As a home care worker he admits spending less than 10 minutes on some visits and as an Uber driver he found little of the role’s much-vaunted freedom, but instead became a slave to the company’s algorithm.

Bloodworth argues that “we live in harsh and uncaring times”, characterised by “a particularly virulent strain of capitalism”. A new consumer class believes “it is entitled to permanently draw upon a reserve army of drudges” to drive taxis, process cheap online purchases or deliver food. But says Bloodworth, there’s no guarantee that these underpaid and exploited “servitors” will put up with being at your beck and call forever.

Although he is careful to guard against easy nostalgia for working conditions in the past, his powerful and important book reveals the true reality of the low-pay economy in Britain today: “something has gone badly wrong in our society for people to be treated in this way”.

• Hired: Undercover in Low-Wage Britain is published by Atlantic (£8.99). To order a copy go to guardianbookshop.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £15, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99.