No one should really defend tipping. It literally has classist history that was updated from that to a racist history and criminal history.
I don’t think you can’t pay extra to someone because you liked them or what they did for you. We have whole holidays for gifts but man if people knew the history of tipping and why Europe picked up Americans anti tipping policy once upon a time I think we could move past it.
Is that really what you think is all they do? I’ve run restaurants and they’re like what nurses are to hospitals, the ones doing most of the work. Everything from cleaning the restaurant to stocking everything, keeping the cooks happy and helping in any way they can
tipping should be illegal because it leads to underpaid workers. but until tipping becomes illegal, you are a fucking asshole if you don’t tip. you’re not sticking it to the man, you’re just shitting on a minimum wage worker because m-muh principles. grow up or move to a country where they don’t tip
We could start paying the entire bill as a tip to mess with the restaurant owner. Keep the same amount, just let it go to the waiter instead.
Just state that the food wasn’t good enough, but the service was great!
Would this be illegal? You are still paying for your food.
I hate that argument though. “You shouldn’t enjoy things because you should pay more than the advertised, because that’s just how things are”. Change doesn’t happen unless change happens. Basically, if you want tipping culture to change, you actually have to start changing tipping culture.
And you think the best way to do that is by stopping waitresses from being able to feed their kids? Because that’s the only thing that will happen if you don’t tip
Overwhelmingly when polled, waits staff much prefer to keep tipping over a living wage. They make far more from tips. Trust me, me not giving a waitress a tip isn’t the line that keeps he kids from dying of hunger.
You alone won’t, but you would definitely be directly contributing to her being closer to said line
Ultimately, the restaurant industry’s management tier collectively agreeing with wait staff that wait staff doesn’t require a working wage and depending on handouts from customers is a fine solution is the problem.
Quite honestly, that isn’t my problem. I’m there for some food, not to be guilted into running a charity function to make up for greedy management and a staff that prefers this bullshit.
If they had to pay their staff more, prices would be higher. If prices are higher, not as many people can afford to go, resulting in prices going up even more. When waiters can rely on tips instead of just the hourly wage, they are given the chance of getting a really nice tip from someone who is generous, resulting in more money than without the tips. By not tipping, you are relying on the generosity of others to keep the workers you aren’t tipping above the line. If you think they don’t deserve to be tipped, don’t go there, otherwise you’re being a mooch in the society you live in, even if it’s in a minor way.
Doesn’t get paid properly to deliver a service you’re relying on.
Tipping culture is stupid, but that doesn’t mean you get to fuck over workers by refusing the tips they rely on. If you want to fight that fight, take it up with the business or your legislator, ya cheap asshole.
Restaurant owners everywhere would be so happy to know you think the customers are the ones fucking over the workers
Do you imagine that the people refusing to pay tips aren’t fucking over the workers, or do you believe that because customers are fucking over workers, the restaurant owners can’t be fucking over the workers too?
It doesn’t matter - either take is transparently stupid.
I believe it is on the owners to provide fair wages to workers. When the plumber, electrician, mechanic, sales rep, or whoever else tells you they don’t make a livable wage, you’re going to feel it is your responsibility to tip them too?
If you don’t want to tip people that can’t otherwise make minimum wage, use restaurants that pay minimum wage. You don’t get to steal those workers’ labour because the restaurateurs and legislators have failed them.
Others industries have to pay minimum wage - your contribution isn’t factored into their base requirements for survival. This is a silly comparison. Do I support an increase in minimum wages? Abso-fucking-lutely - but electricians aren’t routinely being paid less than $3/hr.
You recognize that restauratuers and legislators are the ones failing workers, yet you attribute the lost wages to the paying customer. What can we as paying customers do to fail the workers so that you recognize restauratuers and legislators as being responsible for their fair wages?
If you fail to tip them, you’ve failed them too. It’s not complex.
You argument absolves the restaurateurs if consistently applied because the legislators failed them upstream (that’s not to speak of absolving the legislators because of the voters) - I’m saying the legislators failed them, then the restaurateurs failed them, then the people that refused to tip them failed them. There’s not a single point of failure, but that doesn’t mean it’s OK for you to decide to be the ultimate point of failure.
are you allergic to believing that two things can be true at once
oof another internet user who thinks two things can’t be true at once 💔
“yeah i know i slashed your tires but at least i’m not as bad as the oil and motor lobbies that make it so you’re reliant on your car to fucking commute to work and not starve, you should be grateful next time” — that’s how you sound 🫶
Ayup. I live in a non-tipping country, but in the US, well…
- the farmer doesn’t deal with the customer
- the logistics company doesn’t deal with the customer
- the inspector doesn’t deal with the customer
- the manager doesn’t deal with the customer
- the cook doesn’t deal with the customer
It’s an arsehole tax
An arsehole tax that you don’t need to pay if you are an arsehole?
How would that work?
Me too - though I’ve lived in both.
Choosing to frequent a business that you know underpays their workers, where you know those workers rely on tips to survive, then choosing to take their labour and not pay for that labour isn’t an arsehole tax - it’s an arsehole subsidy, and it’s the workers footing the bill.
I think workers should be paid enough to live comfortably without relying on tips, and that they should be a nice, but entirely unnecessary option - but you don’t get to steal workers’ labour just because you disagree with tipping.
If you don’t think restaurant managers deal with customers than all I can say is I’m so happy for you for never having to work in that industry lol. All of the other people you named also have customers they deal with except maybe the cook. Logistics company is the farmer’s customer, restaurant owner is logistics company’s customer, etc. All of said customers can also be arseholes.
Managers mostly placate and throw their waitstaff under the bus.
And no, logistics companies do not deal with the restaurant patron, the fuck are you on
I didn’t say restaurant patron. Usually there is an employee or even the owner (what i said in my previous reply - not patron) of a restaurant that has to order and receive ingredients and other equipment to run the business. Suppliers also have employees that negotiate and coordinate deliveries with these restaurant staff. In this specific situation, the restaurant managers/owners are the customers of their suppliers.
And i wasn’t talking about logistics customers. I was very clearly talking about the restaurant customer, whom the waiter deals with.
So why should only restaurant customers tip? Why should only waiters expect tips?
Jesus christ dude, let it go.
You know why tipping is a thing in the US, and as I clearly stated, I don’t live in a tipping country
So you’re saying the restaurant owners should give the suppliers a good tip if they’re polite and efficient? Nuance is hard
Not saying they should more than I’m asking why they shouldn’t
I don’t tip as well. But I live in a civilised country where everyone gets at least a tolerable minimum wage. No one is paying me extra money just for doing my job. So I won’t either. If they want more, they need to talk to their employer. It’s not my responsibility.
Would I live in the United States of Idiots though, where a severe lack of ethical economic behaviour is observable, I indeed would tip the waiters, as that’s sadly their financial lifeline.
I’d like to add that in the US people rarely think of it as extra either. In most places in the US we also don’t include taxes on the menu listed prices, but you know they will be on the final bill going in. The semantics of whether there should be tipping or not is hardly the line people should be arguing. What should be argued when discussing tipping is management abuses around tipping (like paying out others, stealing tips, or forced tip sharing), mandated minimum tipping, what items should be tipped and how much.
There is a ton of room to debate tipping culture in the US, but complaining about doing so isn’t the right place.
-Anon comes from cuntry half the size of average American state.
-Anon fails to realize the ezy button ruling a nation of 3rd cousins.
Totally. Everyone being different is the reason we’re okay with unnecessary poverty in this country.
I believe I’m a somewhat generous tipper.
Just today I rounded up a 23 up to 25. Euros that is. And I’m in Finland.
This is considered a generous tip, most don’t tip at all.
When I drove a taxi basically if I had a shift on Christmas eve, then I’d get tips. Otherwise it was like at most 3-5% of riders who gave tips. And this was back in oughts, when people actually used cash. (I literally never had someone tip me on a card when driving a taxi.)
YT things
I’d rather eat a frozen pizza and drink beer in the basement for 1/6th the price.
Fully agree with this but the problem is that restaurant owners pay their staff shit
Give proper wages to servers and the tipping can be history
MA had a ballot initiative that would have gradually brought the minimum tipped wage in line with the state’s minimum wage over the next 5 years or something.
Restaurants posted signs at their door to vote NO and that 90 percent of tipped workers opposed the bill.
A bartender I know told me that I should vote no because if it passed then restaurants would have to reduce headcount and servers who were bad at their jobs would get paid just as well as servers that offer good service.
So it seems like the restaurants just threatened people with losing their jobs and so they voted NO and convinced others to do the same.
The measure didn’t pass.
servers who were bad at their jobs would get paid just as well as servers that offer good service.
Black servers would be paid as well as white servers, servers whose chefs fucked up would be paid as well as lucky servers, mice would chase cats and the world would turn inside out!
yes and if you think this comment is off base, question your privelage and motives because you are empirically incorrect!
This study examined the effects of server race, customer race, and their interaction on restaurant tips while statistically controlling for customers’ perceptions of service quality and other variables. The findings indicate that consumers of both races discriminated against Black service providers by tipping them less than White service providers. Journal of Applied Psychology 2008
Yeah all of that is what is known in the business as propaganda. The more money you have the more propaganda you can put out and restaurant businesses have a lot of spare money because they don’t pay their workers shit.
Reminds me of when I worked at Wal-Mart and everyone was horrified at the idea of getting raises because it meant prices would go up…
I waited tables for years. (I was good at it, and even helped train everyone at a new restaurant.) Hourly pay would have definitely lowered my wage, but it’s still better than tipping. It’d be cool to get hourly wage, or even commission, so that your pay isn’t based on people’s whims.
servers who were bad at their jobs would get paid just as well as servers that offer good service.
(Note: I use the general “you” a lot. You’re just repeating what someone else said, I assume you don’t have any wait staff working for you personally.) You can fire people for being bad at their jobs. Why do you have bad staff working for you, tips or no? How about: Unattractive people will get paid just as well as traditionally attractive people. Minorities will get paid just as well as whites. Your salary doesn’t hinge on whether you can sneak extra stuff to your tables without your boss finding out or putting up with sexual harassment. Salary means that my paycheck comes from the restaurant and I don’t have to try to balance the interests of the people paying me against the restaurant.
I tip if I order food at a sitdown place out of habit and social pressure. Maybe my ignorance is the problem in the world but, I don’t understand how I could feel the service went above or beyond handing me a bag if all they do is hand me a bag.
If you live in a place where food service workers are underpaid and you don’t tip, you’re an asshole. This is not a morally defensible stance unless there is a system to protect those workers already in place.
You’re right. I should just not go there at all, watch the business collapse, and see them beg for jobs at the next shitty restaurant. That’s the better option apparently?
yes. you accidentally hit on the decent thing to do. if you can’t afford tipping in the context of a system that forces individuals to rely on it, go buy groceries.
Yes
That is the high road tbh… plus you can just go to joints that not require tipping. They are on the rise.
Also, many places just slap 20% now anyway… so we are in some clown reality where it is now a service fee and owner can just take it because they pay minwage lol
Peasants can never win here.
They’re not employed by me. Wages are between them and their boss. Any more from anywhere else should not be treated as anything other than the optionally-given gift it is.
Tipping culture essentially amounts to legalized wage discrimination.
And you think the customer is the asshole because the system works.
Customers who don’t tip are. They are punishing a worker for the crimes of a system. The restaurant owner/manager doesn’t suffer if you don’t tip. Only the workers do. So until a change comes to the system where workers get paid minimum wage, not tipping isn’t morally defensible.
You said it yourself, it’s the system that needs to change. As long as we keep chasing our tails trying to blame the customer base instead of the real problem, the ones profiting keep laughing.
*edited 1st sentence for better phrasing
Okay? So push for better laws and higher minimum wage on one hand and until those changes are made, then tip with the other. We can do both at the same time. Right?
I would love to agree. Unfortunately this just circles us back to what ObjectivelyIncarnate said above me
While I’m totally for the workers being paid great, it’s not really MY job to do so (unless i own the restaurant I’m eating at. And at those the waiters are paid way above average and don’t need tips). Here we tip for excellent service, not the bare minimum to get my food on the table.
If you tip to pay salaries, YOU are the actual asshole that keeps a system alive that is the absolute dogshit in dystopian shitholes with no worker-rights like the US.
If you’re patronizing a restaurant that underpays wait staff and refuse to tip the server, you’re not only fucking them but you’re supporting the system by going to the restaurant in the first place.
If you would’ve actually read the comment, you would’ve been in a clear advantage.
Where i live and eat, staff is paid fair and tips are given. But, as everywhere in this country, for especially good service and not because the customer is forced to because the employer doesn’t pay wages because the system is broken.
I also said that at my restaurants, waiting staff is paid way above average, which is probably multiple times of your weird country’s mininum. Do you even have a point?
Sure, let me help you! My point is that if you’re patronizing a restaurant that underpays wait staff and refuse to tip the server, you’re not only fucking them but you’re supporting the system by going to the restaurant in the first place.
How does withholding a tip end the current system?
Stop going to such places. I don’t go there (because we don’t have that silly system). Why tip at all? Do u tip the cashier at the supermarket? Your IT-guy? Your mechanic? Your docs? The cops?
But for the sake of the argument: if noone would tip, noone would work as a waiter anymore and employers would have to pay decent salaries. You know, like everyone civilized would do. Instead you support a disgusting asshole employee by paying the staffs salary AND food. What’s next? No salary at all and you should double-tip for rent too? It seems to work. Why not.
-
We don’t tip workers in those other fields you mentioned because they make a livable wage. Food service workers, particularly servers, often make less than minimum wage.
-
I’m glad wherever you live pays their wait staff a livable wage. If that happened in the US, tipping wouldn’t be the way it is now. Unfortunately the system has to change first. Until it does, if a customer patronizes a restaurant, they should tip. If someone can’t afford to tip, they should stay home.
-
The “invisible hand of the market” isn’t going to solve this issue. A change in labor law will. We either need state or federal laws to protect food service workers. Then employers will be forced to pay their staff better and tipping won’t be so compulsory.
-
You’re correct. Their wage is often ~$3/hr. It’s nearly slave labor.
I only tip when I think they deserve a tip. I tipped the last meal I ate out. Nice person who checked every few minutes if we needed anything else. They kept our drinks from getting empty. The service was worth the tip so they got it. That is what the tip is for. Good service, not any service.
checked every few minutes
god damn, i would get annoyed from that much service.
Yep, gimme the food and a kind word, then leave me alone and let me read.
She just walked by and checked. We were not the only table getting that kind of service. She only stopped when she saw a glass getting empty or when she saw we had finished the meal.
Ya’ll are all wrong. Tipping is to compensate the 2 dollars they make an hour. It’s a shitty system, but that’s the deal. If you don’t want to tip then don’t go eat at a restaurant that supports that system. It’s not some luxury add-on for excellent service (though it can be). It is purely to make up for the extremely low wages. Does anyone remember the rest of the dialog in this scene?
That only applies in shit states that allow that wage fuckery. There are several states where the minimum doesnt change based on whether the job receives tips.
This is one of the problems with the argument online. Too many off us have different realities around them. Where I’m at they get a pretty healthy minimum (~$17/h) + tips.
Being a waiter at a decent restaurant is quite lucrative in my area. I don’t want to change that for the person, after all, the waiter is getting a cut off every check. It’s like a form of profit sharing! However, I’d rather just have the prices on the menu reflect reality and the business handle all the dispersion of pay without me and my feelings getting manipulated for an extra 5% (after the previously established 18% tip standard was deemed too low by people who get tipped that for decades.)
this would be cool info to have. do you think there is a state by state or municipality breakdown that shows the degree to which me not tipping is a burden to the staff? /gen would be slay to have in my bookmarks!
Except the food cost is only a small part of what we are paying for at a restaurant. What we are paying for is the worker’s time and skills. We could, mostly, eat the same ingredients at home for much cheaper.
A lot of the other costs are small and make profit in scale.
In this case wouldn’t the cooks time and skills be more important? Almost anyone can carry a plate but it takes a more diverse set of skills to cook various meals in timely manner while trying to prepare another 10 orders as well.
Not to say the server isn’t important as well but tbh, I’d rather have shitty service and great tasting food than have amazing service and terrible food. Ideally great food and great service, that will defintely get me back.
hey the waiter doesnt carry the food, the runner does that
the waiter asks me how im doing every 5 minutes and upsells me drinks and excess food. now that is special
You undervalue good service. Good service, like good cooks, keep people with allergies from dying. Who exactly do you think passes on the allergy information? In a more general manner, good service makes sure that your order is presented the the kitchen staff correctly and matches expectations when they say it’s ready. It’s not just about whether or not they have a pleasant demeanor.
I could get the best service I’ve ever had, if the food tastes bad, makes me sick, or is undercooked I won’t be returning.
I could have rude service, have to send my order back for being wrong, and maybe even wait a while, if that food is delicious I’ll be coming back.
It takes a whole team to run a restaurant but if the food sucks or is unsafe no amount of good service will make up for that.
Cooks wages are integrated into the price of the food, and the waiter’s are not. But some times cooks are tipped out too.
Sounds like a broken system where workers are being exploited. The operating costs of everything should be pirced into the food. Customer’s shouldn’t be expected to subsidize wages.
To insure proper service. Congratulations, everyone at the joint now knows your face and that you’re cheap.
You’ll get the worst service imaginable at your once favorite place. You’ve ruined it for yourself.
Jokes on you, we don’ 'Merica
Sounds a lot like the maffia. “Pay protection money or else we’ll tear your shop down”
So waiters spit in my food because I pay the amount that’s in the menu, and I’m the problem here?
So what you’re saying is, tips are bullshit, and it’s really just a shakedown? Got it.
