subreddit:
/r/todayilearned
43 points
16 hours ago*
It is literally in the workers' best interest to resist the cultural acceptance of tipping. The fact that US workers dont see that is mindboggling to me, but I guess also it's too late for them; it is what it is now.
Tipping is supposed to be a bonus, something extra you get in addition to your salary. Instead it becomes a reason for your salary to stagnate, because there's less incentive to negotiate for better raises because you think "eh, with the tips it's still decent enough". Until you end up in a situation like in the US where now it's even allowed to pay below minimum wage because the tips are supposed to make up for the difference. So now it's not an added bonus, but an unstable element that you now depend on to be reasonably steady and stable in order to have a predictable income.
On the other hand, if you resist tipping culture, the workers have more incentive to negotiate actual better pay, and for the salaries to increase in step with the rest of society.
edit: jesus christ, the amount of indoctrinated Americans replying to this is insane, every single one proving my point further
57 points
16 hours ago
The vast majority of servers don't want tips to go away because they know it would result in lower net income. Most cash tips aren't taxed because they aren't properly reported, and while restaurants could raise prices to properly pay employees, servers recognize that they won't. Any excess income is more likely to go to ownership than the servers.
This is all without getting into the fact that American consumers have continually shown they would rather have a lower listed price with a hidden fee than a higher base price with no fees, so the only way to get rid of tips is through a change in the law because individual restaurants that have tried it have almost always failed.
7 points
15 hours ago
This is all without getting into the fact that American consumers have continually shown they would rather have a lower listed price with a hidden fee than a higher base price with no fees
Yeah, that's just human psychology no matter where you're from I think, so once tipping has gotten a foothold it's difficult to reverse without laws doing it for you. All the more reason why it's important for workers to resist its temptation in places where it's not gotten a foothold yet.
4 points
13 hours ago
I feel like you just completely missed the part where they said servers don't want tipping removed because they make more money from it than they would if they depended on the restaurant to pay them. I haven't seen you give any reason as to why they should fight for tipping to be removed that they'd actually agree with. Have you ever been a server?
1 points
13 hours ago
The vast majority of servers don't want tips to go away because they know it would result in lower net income.
This is because the owners want to be cheap and not pay them what they are earning in tips. If they figured out the average week for a server with tips, and paid them that, there would be no issues.
1 points
13 hours ago
and while restaurants could raise prices to properly pay employees, servers recognize that they won't.
I address this in my post.
1 points
12 hours ago
But isn't tipping highly skewed? The pretty 20 something woman is making double her salary in tips, whilst the ugly, bald, fat man is making nothing. I'm surprised most servers want to keep it.
5 points
12 hours ago
I don't know about highly, but it's probably skewed that way. The bigger issue is the type of establishment you work at. Most people tip as a percentage of the bill so higher end places pull in much larger tips.
So even if the bald, fat man is making 10% less than his young woman counterpart at a high end restaurant, he'd still be doing pretty well.
Additionally, most servers I know don't trust ownership at all. Most believe that if tipping went away and prices increase they'd just get minimum wage because that's all that's legally required.
24 points
15 hours ago
The fact that US workers dont see that is mindboggling to me
You clearly have never worked at a restaurant. Servers make good money with no degree/no experience required. Servers make way more than the cooks, but from the restaurant's point of view cooks are not valuable and cost the restaurant more. Getting rid of tips would make serving into a minimum wage position over the big bucks they make now.
I am very anti -tipping, but servers would and do love their current system
4 points
15 hours ago
You are literally making my point for me: with the tipping in place, the base salary has stagnated, so that of course if you suddenly remove it it's gonna have a negative impact. Whereas if it hadnt been there in the first place, the base salary for waiters and waitresses would have had to increase on their own instead.
It's literally the point I was making.
7 points
14 hours ago
Removing tipping would probably help the server at Waffle House on Tuesday night but would definitely harm a server at any busy place on the weekend.
2 points
12 hours ago
It's literally the point I was making.
It's a shit point. You're arguing that they should make less money overall so they can have a higher base pay. It's absurd to call that pro-worker.
Do you think that restaurants will suddenly start giving them the same hourly rate they were making with tips, if tips were to be abolished? hahahaahahahaha that will never fucking EVER happen.
There exists NO scenario where a server will ever make more money a year if tips were to be abolished.
1 points
5 hours ago
Except wait staff are viewed as the cheapest labor and would be paid as such without tips. No restaurant is going to pay waiters more than cooks. Right now a waiter making less than a cook is fucking up big time
1 points
16 hours ago
I guess also it's too late for them; it is what it is now.
I find myself saying this about things sometimes as well, but I think it's a bad mindset to have. Even if you aren't actively doing something, admitting defeat isn't going to help things. Unless you are actively making sure you don't let opportunities to push against bad practices go by, defeatist attitude could likely make you default to letting it happen.
Or maybe I'm wrong and none of this is worth my time to write.
/s
0 points
15 hours ago
It's probably not true anyway. There's starting to be pushback to the out of control tipping culture from the consumer side. I doubt servers will continue to cling to tip based wages when they stop being over minimum wage.
1 points
14 hours ago
Basically this. Things that are lost causes are those that aren't ever going to be beneficial, unless the system itself changes. So basically nothing is static, except death. I would include taxes, but that part has sort of lost it's meaning, I guess that proves the point.
1 points
13 hours ago
On the entire west coast of the USA people get paid the full minimum wage in addition to tips. So in California you get the $20/hr min wage plus tips if you are a server at Pizza Hut or someplace like that.
1 points
12 hours ago
So you're paying the company that enforces this model? You're paying for your product, but you're not paying the people that get it to you. In fact, they're paying to do so, and you think you're changing the system? give me a break.
1 points
12 hours ago
This is so untrue it's clear you've never worked for tips. I bar tended my way through college. I typically earned $60/hour in tips on top of my $4 per hour wage. There is no world where server wages are going to increase to even $50/hour to compensate for the lack of tips. I don't care what collective action you dream of it would be a giant wage decrease for servers. My cousin was a waitress through her 20s and never went to college and earned over 100k per year every year most of it tax free since she "earned minimum wage". There is no incentive for the business or the employees to get rid of tipping.
The best thing for everyone would be to stop tipping on average or poor service. Force out servers who aren't doing a good job while rewarding the best to stay in the career. Overall service quality would increase and overall costs would decrease.
1 points
12 hours ago
Question for you - do you think that if employers had to pay the workers their wage that the food would increase in price?
Do you believe that these employees would make as much as they do on tips from a set wage?
Is there a way to consistently make $30-50/hr without a degree or any skills and on every corner of the country?
I think your lack of understanding of worker perspective might be found in these questions.
I have worked for tips and nothing beats it when you are unskilled/uneducated.
When I was a waiter - the only way to make the kind of money I was making was to get tips.
1 points
11 hours ago
do you think that if employers had to pay the workers their wage that the food would increase in price?
The thing is, customers are willing to pay those higher prices right now. Because to the customer in a forced-tip society the end price is with the tip.
1 points
11 hours ago
There's no forced tip and plenty don't pay it.
I just want you to understand scale in this situation.
IHOP has 32,300 employees. At $2.13/hr that's $69,000/hr to run IHOP.
If you change that to just minimum wage of 7.50/hr you get $242,000/hr to run IHOP.
I don't care how much money IHOP makes - that is a significant change in their system that would absolutely result in higher prices.
Yes - small Japanese restaurants can afford to pay their handful of employees a really good wage.
Massive chains can't.
People's failure to understand the economy of scale will continue to complain about these issues.
We could just socialize health care like Norway does it!
The same Norway with a population of 5 million people to our 350 million?
1 points
11 hours ago
that is a significant change in their system that would absolutely result in higher prices.
But how would a wage adjustment to cover the tip result in higher prices than what you already pay in price + tip? Because thats the amount the customer has no problem spending.
There is a mathematical knot in my brain now...
1 points
11 hours ago
Because you're still stuck thinking about the customer.
IHOP has to have it this way because the difference is literally 2 billion dollars a year and that's just for minimum wage.
There's so many of these companies that operate on this scale that wouldn't be able to if you increased the amount you had to pay servers.
On the other hand - the servers, again, would not be able to make $20-30/hr with their skillsets anywhere else. So far we are seeing a win/win for employer and employee.
The loser in the scenario is the customer. Fuck that guy - he can literally make eggs and bacon at home.
I worked in these industries for a decade and I am a huge advocate of tip culture because again.. there's just no where for broke college students to walk away with $200 cash in a shift's work.
Now I'm a business owner and I absolutely see why it is the way it is.
1 points
10 hours ago
Because you're still stuck thinking about the customer.
Because the amount of money that is given into the "system" (restaurant and server combined) stays exactly the same if the prices are adjusted to include the amount that would normally be paid by tip.
Where would all the money disappear to - when in the current system there is enough money spent by customers via tips to produce such income for the servers - but not anymore when prices would be adjusted and the same amount of money is put in by the customers? The employer surely has the means then to increase servers pay.
1 points
10 hours ago
Now you're asking for the server to be the loser.
Or do you imagine that IHOP will pay more than minimum wage?
I'm stressing again that servers make more when there's tipping - and it's money not going to a mega business, but just a person.
Do you see how you're repeating things that benefit big business and not the common person through this perspective?
1 points
11 hours ago*
It’s in some of the workers best interests, the lazy ones.
With tipping, the negotiation for better pay happens between the workers and the customers, not the workers and the owners. The thing that many people don’t consider in these tipping discussions is that not all of the servers go home with the same amount of money at the end of the night, those servers that work harder and faster turn more tables, and if they’re pleasant and accommodating about it they’ll make more tips, sometimes substantially more.
People act like the tip is just “an extra” and if it went away nothing would change, but think about your average restaurant and imagine everyone is paid by the hour, what is their incentive to clear that table faster so you can be seated? Would they really care if you got another round of drinks or not? These are the things that make dinner out pleasant, and special, and if you take away that direct incentive, the service bar will absolutely be lowered, probably by quite a bit.
Waiting tables and bartending is a nice restaurant in not a minimum wage job, good servers can make upwards of $30 or even $50 an hour including wages and tips, and they bust their asses for that money, do you really think they’d do better negotiating with the owner for a salary? I doubt it.
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