Hmmm, not all customs are good (circumcision female/male, slavery, ritual scaring, drowning children of the "wrong" gender), expecting somebody to adhere to a custom where a vulnerable low wage earner is forced to beg publicly to supliment thier wage so that they can live below the poverty line and that custom is alien to them shows a level of cultural insensitivity.
I would still tip while visiting country that practiced the odious habit of humiliating the poor through the revolting tipping custom (as it hurts the employee more not to tip) I would also let my friends from that country know that I find the custom disturbing and they need to do something about it.
Like I said several posts back if I was in a place where tipping was customary I would tip but I would tell my friends In that country that tipping custom/culture is bad and they should do something about it it.
I understand DMUTBs position but I think it hurts the employee as I said in my previous post...
$2.13 is shocking and embarrassing.
But in my eyes (and all of the non US posters) tipping culture and is forcing a person to beg.
When I see a menu - I want tax and wages factored into the food cost.
I tip when the service has been good, when we have been loud or asked for difficult menu choices or we have made a mess. I know that the hospitality worker is getting a wage they can live on, they don't have to be nice to me and they don't have to fawn on me and they don't have to pretend I am their social better.
US style tipping is an interesting evolution of the hospitality industry. When I was in the US I found it confusing at times, but ultimately didn't have an issue with conforming to the expected norm.
On paper, it's a means to make the wait staff part-shareholders in the business. As in, of all the revenue coming into the place - a percentage hypothetically goes directly to the waitstaff; making them less 'employees' and more 'shareholders' that directly benefit and suffer when the business is busy or not.
With my black hat on it's also a way of cost minimization by the employers, where the static part of their wages can be minimized as much as possible leaving them open to periods of tip-famine if a restaurant is not doing well.
Shrugs - I'd be just as happy though having a flat service charge factored into the price.
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Ummm social custom, you can shame me about - alcohol consumption - violence, death, family breakdown. What Australians consider normal most of the world would see as terminal.
Most western (and a lot of non western) democracies are capable of (or have the will too) pay a higher minimum wage. The US is backwards and behind in this situation.
The current system is ingrained into the culture and economic reality of the US, so changing it takes time. You could probably just change the minimum wage to $15/hour from one day to the next, but that would suck for everyone, until things settle into the new normal. Which would probably take years. But once the dust settles, things might be better for the long haul.
I say ya'll should go for it!
Ummm social custom, you can shame me about - alcohol consumption - violence, death, family breakdown. What Australians consider normal most of the world would see as terminal.
Lol, yeah. Went on holiday, had to kill a red back in my bathroom when I got home. Bloody random encounters.
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OK, I think most of the tippers and non-tippers agree that the wage system for servers in the U.S. sucks, and people should earn a living wage for doing work in a competent manner. I think we can also agree that by my continuing to post in this thread, I am at least slightly insane and/or I dumped INT & WIS. However...
The reality is that for the foreseeable future, the wage issue for servers and others at the bottom of the U.S. economic engine isn't going to be fixed anytime soon. That's just the way it is. Until these problems are addressed, tipping is needed to offset the pitiful wage a server makes. If you are opposed to tipping as a custom and necessity of the U.S. service industry, fine, you'll get no argument from me on that.
But not tipping the server who just worked hard to service you in a satisfactory (or better) manner doesn't do anything except stiff the $2.13/hr server for work already rendered on your behalf.
Lobby for legislative raising of wages, pressure employers to voluntarily agree to raise compensation to livable wages, help organize unions, rail against the tipping custom to your spleen's content... sure that's all great. But none of it, not a single bit of it, is going to put badly-needed money from tips in your server's pocket tonight, tomorrow, the next paycheck, or in the immediate future. Without tips, how are your servers and their families supposed to survive until then?
OK, I think most of the tippers and non-tippers agree that the wage system for servers in the U.S. sucks, and people should earn a living wage for doing work in a competent manner. I think we can also agree that by my continuing to post in this thread, I am at least slightly insane and/or I dumped INT & WIS. However...
The reality is that for the foreseeable future, the wage issue for servers and others at the bottom of the U.S. economic engine isn't going to be fixed anytime soon. That's just the way it is. Until these problems are addressed, tipping is needed to offset the pitiful wage a server makes. If you are opposed to tipping as a custom and necessity of the U.S. service industry, fine, you'll get no argument from me on that.
But not tipping the server who just worked hard to service you in a satisfactory (or better) manner doesn't do anything except stiff the $2.13/hr server for work already rendered on your behalf.
Lobby for legislative raising of wages, pressure employers to voluntarily agree to raise compensation to livable wages, help organize unions, rail against the tipping custom to your spleen's content... sure that's all great. But none of it, not a single bit of it, is going to put badly-needed money from tips in your server's pocket tonight, tomorrow, the next paycheck, or in the immediate future. Without tips, how are your servers and their families supposed to survive until then?
Except the $2.13/hour isn't quite true. An employer is only allowed to pay that little IF the employee would make enough in tips to bring them up to minimum wage. If your hourly + tips is less than minimum wage, your employer is breaking the law.
Based on the current system, a server (and their union if they have one) is responsible for protecting their own rights, it is not the customers responsibility to protect them. I think this system unduly puts the burden on the employee to protect themselves, leaving them too open to abuse and corruption.
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I think the mods like Chris need a tip jar for their thankless work.
Their employer pays them for their time. This is an arrangement both parties have agreed to. It's their job.
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Their employer pays them for their time. This is an arrangement both parties have agreed to. It's their job.
An arrangement worked out (and indeed, only legal) in the context of tipping as a societal norm.
It's amazing to me what people are willing to overlook to justify their behavior.
So, fun anecdote for starters:
When I left the fun world of used record storedom, I got a job at the airport with a ground-handling company that had started up at Logan Airport. It was pretty shiznitty (I think they had been in operation for less than a year when I started working there; as soon as I made my 30 days I jumped into to help out with organizing into the Teamsters, but, alas, we ran into the Railways Act...but thats's another story entirely) but, unlike the used record store, it offered tons of overtime. I started doing seventy-hour weeks and Ariel, the sexy roller derby chick I've mentioned before, who was working as a waitress was like "Doodlebug, why are you doing that? What kind of life can you have if you're working seventy hours a week?" and I was all like, "If I work seventy hours a week, I can make five hundred bucks!" (I've never made more than $27k/year, either, Comrade Toenibbler) and she was like "Pfft, I make five hundred bucks over the weekend!"
Anyway, I'm sure TOZ meant it metaphorically, but I like this quote: "Giving one man a feast while letting twenty others starve is not generosity" and I was pondering it at work and I told myself a story and it went like this:
Mary Alice works at Sloe Gin Fizz's. She makes $2.13/hour and covers three tables. During that hour, three couples come in, order two $12 entrees each and a couple of drinks for a $40 tab. Each tips the socially contacted 20% leaving Mary Alice with $26.13. One of the tables leaves early and in comes Citizen Buri, cheap bastard, sociopath and all around not nice guy, who doesn't tip anythng. Mary Alice calls him names, gives half of her tips away (which sounds high to me, but I've never been a waiter) and walks away from the hour with $13.
Meanwhile, across town, her sister, Alice Mary, works at the Jack-in-the-Box where she serves fifty customers in an hour, busts her ass, smiles constantly and still only gets $8.50/hour. Shiznit, let's say she's a crew leader and gets $9.50. On the way home, she wants to...
Do virtual standing ovations count? That was great.
[Cries over all the favorited posts I lost]
I'm still not tipping Dicey!
[Blushes at Comrade Barrister's kind words]
Their employer pays them for their time. This is an arrangement both parties have agreed to. It's their job.An arrangement worked out (and indeed, only legal) in the context of tipping as a societal norm.
It's amazing to me what people are willing to overlook to justify their behavior.
They're still guaranteed minimum wage under the law, even if you don't tip. The employer can only get away with paying them less BECAUSE you tip.
Which excuses your behavior how?"How dare you exploit your workers! To show how much I disapprove of your exploitation of your workers, I'm going to give one of your workers a 0% tip! That'll show you, owner-who-doesn't-care-about-tips! Take that!"
If everyone used your logic, environmentalists would be protesting deforestation by going out and murdering endangered rainforest creatures!
By God Scott, you and I don't agree often, but that is one of the funniest and most apropos statements I've ever read by you.
Of course I tip 20% minimum and for abysmal service 10-15%. Or so I tell myself. The reality is that I tip 20 plus percent all the time. In the interest of Goblin-like stories, I have one.
I work a ton of hours. I rarely get paid (because of impracticality) for every hour I work. Yesterday was Lincoln's Birthday, which for some reason is a State holiday here in Missouri. All State office buildings are closed, including courthouses. So. I had a day with nothing scheduled, and while I had plenty I could do in the office, I decided to treat myself to a day off. I had been looking forward to this for a couple of weeks. I got out of bed late, went to a local diner, and ordered an omelet, hash browns, biscuits and gravy, and some coffee, and proceeded to read a novel.
The waitress filled my coffee once when I first ordered it. Then I didn't see her. My cup went empty. Then my food arrived (carried by another waitress) who dropped it off so quickly I couldn't ask for coffee. So I started eating. Pretty soon I really needed some coffee to wash down my food. So I got up and wandered the restaurant looking for my waitress. I finally found her and asked for more coffee. She came by, said sorry, she actually forgot I was there and filled it up. When I paid, my bill came to just under 8 dollars. I gave her a 10 and told her to keep the change. (That is a little more than 20 percent) Why? Because of 2 reasons. One, she was probably honestly busy, and forgot. Two, one extra dollar means a lot more to her than it does to me. Tipping should be optional, but only if the government is going to treat it as optional. Once wait staff get paid at least minimum wage, we can happily relegate it to a true gratuity for exceptional service. Until then, don't be a jerk.
As to folks from non-tipping cultures who come to the US, please just follow our customs in the same fashion you expect us to follow yours. I often see people on this board complaining about how Americans see American exceptionalism everywhere, insist on doing things their way, and refuse to acknowledge differences in social practices in other nations because of it. Isn't a refusal to follow tipping customs of a country you visit on the basis of some vague notion of teaching us something just as bad?
I travel extensively. I take a vacation to another country once a year because other than gaming books I don't even use because my group disbanded, the big luxury I treat myself with is travel, and I always attempt to learn as much of the customs of a place (including tipping) as I can before I go there, just so I don't come across as some rude American. Can't we expect the same of you?
You probably want to reconsider ever listening to whoever told you that was true.Let’s talk about minimum wage. Obama said, “No one working full-time should have to raise a family in poverty.”
And his solution? Raising the minimum wage to $10.10 over 3 years
I absolutely welcome any step forward on raising the minimum wage. And it is outrageous how the Republican Party is standing in the way.
But let’s be honest: $10.10/hour over three years – or $20,000 per year if you are lucky enough to have a full-time job – is not a ticket out of poverty for working families.
Raising minimum wage does nothing to solve poverty. Companies just use it as an excuse to raise prices, which means that all it will do is devalue the currency.
Until that problem is solved, raising minimum wage is a losing proposition.
I'd, myself, call it a diminishing return. The problem with a large hike in the minimum wage seems to be more with the folks who are already making that amount. I am not sure that the construction workers, plumbing assistants, LPNs etc that make that now will end up with an additional 7-8 per hour, but they very well may feel any rise in costs (which I agree will not be equivalent to the actual raise in pay i.e. the claims that a double cheeseburger at McDonalds will suddenly cost $8 more is ridiculous). One thing is clear, though, the current wage needs to go up by some increment, finding the amount will be the real challenge.
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I tip 20%+ as default for the most part. I also tip my barber (25% at least) and I tip the bartender a dollar a drink even if he is just giving me water (I don't drink alcohol).
Also, if me an my friends eat and then hang out a little bit longer at the table, that's a tip increase just for taking up their station.
This isn't about capitalism, socialism, forumism or Quabism, this is about you going out to a "sit down to eat place" and leaving a tip. You have a problem with the pay structure/labour vs. management issues, etc - that's fine. Just don't frequent establishments where the service is compensated on a tip+supplemented pay structure.
Leave the protest and excuses outside the restaurant. If you want to use a service that customarily expects tips, then tip - otherwise don't use the service. That goes for foreign travelers in the US - the adage of "when in Rome, do as the Romans do" is applies 100%.
I never worked in food service but I worked in retail sales - and that was hell.
Always try to show respect for the worker - I never understood the notion that you would treat the people serving you food like garbage.
Their employer pays them for their time. This is an arrangement both parties have agreed to. It's their job.An arrangement worked out (and indeed, only legal) in the context of tipping as a societal norm.
Irrelevant. It matters not what societal norms exist as long as you are willing to perform services in exchange for a predetermined amount of pay. Waitstaff know going into their role that minimum wage is all they can expect to receive from check to check. You know going into a job, any job, what your guaranteed rate of pay is. If that is insufficient for you then you shouldn't accept that job. Sales and other folks that work on commissions still have to accept the fact they may only make their rate.
The job situation isn't ideal. I never said it was. Facts are facts. To take a job that only guarantees x and you really need x + 1 you're deluded to think that job will provide for you at all times like you need. That kind of job is okay to pass some time or if you have some assistance until you find something better but you shouldn't cry foul when you know going into such an arrangement when it doesn't meet your needs.
Irrelevant. It matters not what societal norms exist
Yep, there we go.
The job situation isn't ideal. I never said it was. Facts are facts. To take a job that only guarantees x and you really need x + 1 you're deluded to think that job will provide for you at all times like you need. That kind of job is okay to pass some time or if you have some assistance until you find something better but you shouldn't cry foul when you know going into such an arrangement when it doesn't meet your needs.
Server work tips tend to approach a (reasonably) steady average on a month-to-month basis. If a server has been working for twenty years and makes a roughly predictable amount of extra income through tips every year, and sees no sign of anything that might cause that to change, why shouldn't he feel confident that next year he will receive a similar amount of tip income?
Regardless of the acceptance of tipping, it is entirely a voluntary practice that could, without much imagination, quickly wane due to other economic forces.
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So once you inspire the servers to demand minimum wage, do you then go on to the next restaurant or keep using the same one? How many places have you successfully converted?
How does that add to the discussion?
So once you inspire the servers to demand minimum wage, do you then go on to the next restaurant or keep using the same one? How many places have you successfully converted?
Irrelevant. It matters not what societal norms exist as long as you are willing to perform services in exchange for a predetermined amount of pay. Waitstaff know going into their role that minimum wage is all they can expect to receive from check to check. You know going into a job, any job, what your guaranteed rate of pay is. If that is insufficient for you then you shouldn't accept that job. Sales and other folks that work on commissions still have to accept the fact they may only make their rate.
You may find it irrelevant, but the minimum wage differs for tipped employees. That is simply a fact.
How does that add to the discussion?
Whatever amount it adds to the discussion, it's certainly more than the number of restaurants your crusade has redeemed from the heathen pits of tipping.