Perhaps you’ve noticed. We have reached a tipping point in the country over tipping.
To tip or not to tip has led to Shakespearean soliloquies by customers explaining why they refuse to tip for certain things.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, customers were grateful for those who seemingly risked their safety so we could get groceries, order dinner or anything that made our lives feel normal. A nice tip was the least we could do to show gratitude.
But now that we are out about and back to normal, the custom of tipping for just about everything has somehow remained; and customers are upset.
A new study from Pew Research shows most American adults say tipping is expected in more places than it was five years ago, and there’s no real consensus about how tipping should work.
This seems to be more of a United States issue rather than a Western issue. In Canada, we didn’t start tipping businesses all of a sudden that were never part of tipping culture. We always tipped delivery drivers, and servers, and bartenders, and hairstylists, and uber drivers. I’ve never seen a tip screen on a McDonalds or Wendys or Popeyes debit machine. I’ve never seen a tip screen on a retail debit machine. What the hell is going on in the US with tipping? What changed?
I’m in Europe. I’ve seen tipping pop up in random places in different countries. It’s most definitely not a US issue.
it’s not your waiter’s fault that they’re stuck in a scam on the scale of a whole culture
Is it mine?
It is of you decide they can starve over it.
When sustainable wage ain’t the minimum wage tipping ain’t a reward for good service, it’s the wage earner’s solidarity tax.
It is of you decide they can starve over it.
Wanting them to work somewhere with they are paid fairly does not equate to that you have no problem with them starving.
It does when you don’t tip them.
No, it doesn’t.
You can wish the best for them, and want them to have a happy and healthy life, and not tip them when they don’t do anything deserving of a tip.
Deserve ain’t the metric when they’re being paid below a living wage.
You’re arguing they should provide five star service and suck your dick to “deserve” not needing to choose between heating and electricity that month.
Deserve ain’t the metric when they’re being paid below a living wage.
The two are not connected though either.
You’re arguing they should provide five star service and suck your dick to “deserve” not needing to choose between heating and electricity that month.
No, I’m not. Please don’t put words in my mouth, especially emotionally hyperbolic ones.
Wow, this “etiquette expert” grift is more interesting than the article itself.
Tipping needs to end. It’s the employer’s responsibility to make sure their employees are paid reasonably. Instead they pass that responsibility to the customer, ensuring tension between customers and staff.
I used to be a consistent tipper.
Now I refused to tip at all.
I want workers to demand what they are worth to their employers, and I’m willing to be the asshole to help them accomplish that.
If we all stopped tipping, they’d have no choice but to turn the low wage issue around onto their employers. Then employers will have no choice but the pay their workers more, because otherwise they’d leave their industry for something else.
I don’t care if that means we, as consumers, have to pay a bit more for the food and service. I don’t care if that means that some businesses won’t survive. I want fairness all around
I refuse to tip anywhere new and expand this practice… But with things like restaurants or delivery? Without organization, all that does is further underpay people for their work and increase the chances of spitting in your food
I don’t think there’s a good answer, so I just do it much less
I used to think that way as well. But really, if spit in my food is being used as a threat to tip someone isn’t that extortion?
I’m polite, easy to serve, and even if the food is over-cooked and way too salty (as it was for the single taco I ordered last time I was out) I don’t ask for it to be returned. I’m a model customer, except I won’t tip.
I’m not doing it to be cheap, or out of spite, or in disrespect for the service personnel. I’m doing it to apply pressure so that things will change for the better
Think of it as passive guerilla tactics against a broken system
But what about the inherent coercion of capitalism? The fear of having your food spit in is a kind of coercion, but despite the system being broken, people who rely on tips need that money to survive
It’s a messy issue. If everyone refused to tip as a matter of course and they were paid a living wage I think things would be improved, but on a more immediate and direct level you’re reducing their pay
It’s a systematic problem… Maybe it can be handled individually, but that will create a lot of issues until the pressure of individuals can prompt systematic change
I would rather they felt the pressure to move on to different employment (if they can find it) than deal with the uncertainty and fickle nature of tippers
Where I live some restaurants have started requesting no tips because they pay their workers what they’re worth. If those are around when I go out, I go there. In their absence I don’t tip
Other countries of the world have it figured out, why can’t the U.S? We can be better. Sometimes you have to take a hard stand that feels counter-intuitive to the causes you believe in, in order to push things in the right direction. Do I feel bad about not tipping? Certainly. But I want change for the better and that requires applying pressure to the right places
I’m not ideologically opposed to what you’re saying - I agree with the end goal, I’m just worried about methods. I’m even fine with tipped employees suffering for a bit during transition
But changing jobs is purposely difficult…I don’t think that’s a fair demand through effectively reducing their wages
On the other hand, you brought up something great - if you have places around that have transitioned to a living wage, why not push to go there instead? Restaurants can make this change in a couple weeks if properly motivated, but it would take months of employees struggling until they leave to affect that level of change, and I’d argue a restaurant is more likely to look around and adopt a better business model when their customers dry up than to realize the reason they can’t keep staff is due to tipping expectations
I’m all for your strategy to pressure the holdouts once the tides have turned in an area, and maybe your area is at that stage… But I don’t think most of the country is nearly there yet
There’s nothing wrong with tipping. I like the option to reward someone who made my experience great. Keyword there is option. Employers should pay employees a living wage, and if customers want to reward a great job with a few bucks on top of that, that should be allowed, even encouraged, but should never feel obligated to tip or shamed for not tipping.
You should feel ashamed for making someone act as your slave for minimum wage. The least you could do is pay them what they’re worth.
If you don’t like it, don’t force tipped workers to work for you. You have full control here. You could just cook your own damn food.
I said living wage, homie, not minimum wage. I think everyone should be paid at least a living wage, I just said tipping in general isn’t bad - it just shouldn’t be used to supplement poor wages.
Okay, but they don’t have a living wage, so you don’t get to have that option. Either tip or stop using those services.
What fucking conversation do you think you’re a part of? Because you’re clearly not reading my comments before responding to them.
You said customers should never feel obligated or ashamed. Never. I definitely feel ashamed of using these services and feel obligated to tip generously, and you should too.
You’re either intentionally being obtuse or are just plain stupid. Customers SHOULDNT be in a position of being forced to tip or be ashamed for normal acitivitues. Absolutely required tipping should not be a thing. It should be optional. It doesn’t matter what the current culture is, because that’s not the conversation. That’s the point.
So we’re in agreement then? Why are you lighting me up when we’re clearly on the same side? You need to learn to recognize an ally and save the anger for someone who deserves it, or you’ll find yourself without any allies.
Pretty sure you’re not responding to the employer
The customer creates the demand.
Been in Japan this summer. A culture where tipping is non-existent. It was such a great experience to not worry about tipping. Instead you simply get outstanding service all the time and workers are simply paid a fair wage.
The “pure greed” framing makes a lot more sense when talking about CEO pay ratios or something. Of course the server making the $2/hr tipped wage is “greedy” for more money, that’s called “wanting to live.”
It’s greedy when it goes from “please tip I need money to make a living wage” to “don’t get rid of tipping, I make 80k a year from it.” Just get paid normally like the rest of us. Forced tipping is a scam.
Maybe instead of tipping more we should just get rid of tip wage.
If businesses close, then they couldn’t be im business without exploitation of their workers and don’t deserve to be in business.
I went to a brewery recently where they swipe your card at the entrance and hand you a little black credit card type thing. You find your own seats, you go grab a glass, and you insert the card into a slot at a beer tap and pour your own beer, priced by the ounce. If you want food, you go to a kiosk, put your card in, and order food. When it’s ready, you go to the kitchen and pick it up to bring back to your seat. When you leave, you bring the card back up to the register and they charge you for all the food and drink. But then it asks you how much you wanna tip. Who the fuck am I tipping? I was my own host, my own bartender, my own waiter, my own bus boy. I haven’t seen an actual employee here except for some woman who swiped my credit card during a 5 second interaction.
Wtf is the point of this. Even if they wanted to save on labor costs of wait staff and everything why not just use your own card instead of trading it for a temporary card.
It’s like this pizza place I went to recently. They had a little arcade so I went to put some quarters in and realized I had to go buy tokens at a machine first. It wasn’t Dave and Busters or anything, just a hole in the wall with a few games in a corner. I didn’t buy any tokens. Same with laundromats that now want you to buy tokens ahead of time.
There isn’t a single business anymore that isn’t trying to just blatantly scam you out of your money. They used to at least be more subtle about it.
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You’re comparing weeks of spending to a couple hours at a bar though, I’m not sure if that’s really comparable.
There’s a couple other reasons that apply as well:
Because they get charged less by the bank for lower quantity of bigger transactions, instead of high number of small transactions. Also allows for people who have cash but no card to use the system.
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I never tip anywhere I’m just picking up food and paying at the register. It annoys me as a customer and I wish they would quit asking.
I stopped going to Domino’s because of this. I’m not tipping when I’m the one picking up the pizza.
Try this on for size: Tipping is a Legacy of Slavery
This opinion by Michelle Alexander always stuck with me.
The thing that made me want to eliminate tipping is the abuse servers have to suffer in order to justify it. I was front of house for 18 years, and in that time I’ve seen servers sexually harassed, sexually assaulted, regular assaulted, food thrown at them and I’ve even heard customers flat out say they base their tipping decisions on the race of their server. The attitude among servers is that you can either tolerate being treated like a second class citizen, or you can go to bed hungry that night.
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Kinda blows that whole “To Insure[sic] Prompt Service” myth out of the water, doesn’t it?
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How can the US actually end tipping culture? I cannot fathom a way forward that doesn’t fuck over a lot of people in the short-term. Ideas?
Set the minimum wage for waiters same as for other professions?
Makes sense. The issue is that many service workers are making well above minimum wage via tipping, and they’re supporting their families off it. I guess raise universal minimum wage alongside tipping ban?
No, raise the wage and make tipping optional. Simply move from ‘tipping is part of their wage, they need it because they make below minimum wage’ to ‘tipping is a reward for good service’. You can leave it but they will not starve without it.
This is a problem as well. I read at Casa Bonita they eliminated tipping and started paying the staff $30/h. And some of the staff are mad about it, which I kinda get but it’s a feast or famine type deal. Some days you really make a ton on tipping, and some days you get left a fake $100 from some evangelical asshole. I’d rather count on a guaranteed wage than a maybe. Full disclosure though, I’ve never worked in a tipping profession so I may be missing some things.
There’s only one thing I still do that requires tipping, and that’s because I want to get tattoos. After I started seeing tipping screens at restaurants where I pick up my food at the counter, I stopped eating out entirely. I don’t even do fast food. I’m tired of trying to remember or decipher what is socially expected and am just done participating in that system. Just pay people a living wage, charge what you need to charge for that, and if you’re offering a worthwhile service, you’ll be fine.
Just pay people a living wage, charge what you need to charge for that, and if you’re offering a worthwhile service, you’ll be fine.
Someone tell me the reason why this would get downloaded?
Like with every single thing that humans try to do to help each other, corporations have figured out how to exploit it for themselves.
We feel like tipping helps people because literally handing money to someone SHOULD help them. Except what actually happens is that corporations, with the full support of the government that they own, simply use that social convention to offset the wages that they have to pay their staff.
“Etiquette expert” whatd do they do? Just going about yelling at people for doing things a different way. “YOURE SUPPOSED TO HAVE YOUR PINKY UP WHILE DRINKING TEA!!!”
That was last year, now it is an offence if you have your pinky up…You HAVE TO STAY UP TO DATE, MAN!!!
Ah dang I missed a few episodes of etiquette news.
Ah, nevermimd… Just got the info a few minutes ago, it’s mandatory again.
Tipping should never be expected
Tipping was always stupid from day 1. I’ve spent most of my life being told I’m a moron for being against tipping culture and instead wanting fair wages and clear prices. Suddenly in recent years people realize how stupid tipping is simply cause it went to its logical extreme. People are morons.
If you are for fair wages and clear prices, that means you’re actively boycotting all restaurants right? You wouldn’t be a hypocrite to still patronize these establishments that exploit their workers and expect you to cover the difference right?
Every moron who doesn’t tip thinks this way. Nobody wants to tip, and hopefully someday it will be universally abolished, but until then, this is the way it is and people are just trying to supplement their minimum wages to make a livable income. So just tip them appropriately for the work they do for you already, you moron. I guarantee that as a non-tipper, you are on many service workers’ shit lists, so I guess if you’re not getting good service, it’s your own fault.
FYI, I don’t go to places that expect tipping. But thanks for presuming I don’t tip at all.
Also, as a previous tip-based service worker, I know all this already. But again, thanks for presuming only YOU know things.
and there’s no real consensus about how tipping should work.
Versus how is always worked before?
Because there is consensus on that, it was a very straightfor rule.
The tip was a private transaction between a customer and an employee who went above and beyond the service that the employees’ boss require them to do, to perform the job to the customer’s satisfaction.
It had nothing to do with the boss or the company they were working for (no tipping automation on the registers, etc.).
And it wasn’t ever used in lieu of the employee receiving enough of an income at the company they worked at.
And it wasn’t ever used in lieu of the employee receiving enough of an income at the company they worked at.
Unfortunately that is not true. Restaurants in most states in the US have a law that allows employers to pay tipped employees a much lower wage (about 2 bucks an hour) with the expectation that tips will bring them back up to minimum wage or higher.
Restaurants in most states in the US have a law that allows employers to pay tipped employees a much lower wage
You should check the year that those laws were implemented. They are a more recent phenomenon.
Also as it’s been mentioned by someone else already, those laws included clauses to make sure if the tips were below minimum wage the employees income earned would be raised to minimum wage.
And as an aside (as I’m sure somebody will mention this), I’m not saying that minimum wage is a living wage.
But that is a different subject than the one that’s being discussed here, the responsibility of customers to tip employees so that they may have a living wage, in lieu of employers paying employees a living wage directly.
I’m talking about the past, not the current situation.
Versus how is always worked before?
Because there is consensus on that, it was a very straightforward rule.
The vast majority of people had living wages back then.
The article is saying “before” as in “before the changes that happened because of COVID”. I don’t know when the inflection point was where we shifted to shit wages for traditionally tipped jobs, but it was many many years ago. When COVID hit we were not giving living wages to servers.
The article is saying “before” as in “before the changes that happened because of COVID”.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic
But now that we are out about and back to normal, the custom of tipping for just about everything has somehow remained;
No. Tipping culture 100% existed before COVID. This isn’t an opinion. It’s well documented. You are either willfully ignorant or a troll. This discourse has run its course.
This discourse has run its course.
“So shall it be written, so shall it be done.” /waveshandsabout
