International fans visiting the US for the World Cup have become frustrated by the culture of having to tip servers, telling the BBC that tipping fatigue has set in.
But they don’t have to work for you for free if you don’t go, and you’re not actually subsidizing the restaurant if you’re not paying the menu price.
It’s for sure worse for the worker if you go, pay for your meal, and don’t tip them. The owner doesn’t care, he got his, and if the worker (who gets 0% in either scenario) quits another just takes their place tomorrow.
Maybe on an individual level but if no one goes there won’t be a restaurant or that job for long. Getting something is typically better than getting nothing.
Depends on the pay structure. Tip outs at some places get high, maybe even 10% of total sales. Which would mean 2/3 of your generous 15% tip goes to the kitchen, or the busboy, or whoever, regardless of how much your server had to harangue them into doing their jobs or how much verbal abuse everyone had to endure in the process. Which, as a former server, yes, is part of the job.
If you tip 5% at a place that tips out higher than 5%, guess where the difference comes from. If you guessed the server’s own share of the tip pool, you get a cookie. Sometimes, nothing is in fact better than something.
So why don’t they just get another job? It’s fuckin hard out there, man, maybe they’re trying. You don’t know. It took yours truly 2 years to escape the industry, and I still have a foot planted there because i took a pay cut to do it. I can almost guarantee I make less money than you if you can afford to eat out more than, like, once a month.
And don’t even get me started on the servers who do make beaucoup bucks. They don’t get there on their own, they do it by shirking their side duties, taking a bigger slice of the pie, and “delegating” to their peers, which management loves because it’s “team service.” Granted, the restaurant I worked at was a shitty place to work, but that’s not exactly rare.
So what does this all point to? Tipping sucks, but trying to fight it by tipping less really only hurts the face you see.
My issue isn’t with the service staff, it’s with business owners who are increasingly abusing their workers by offloading their pay onto tips. I mainly fight this by just not eating out or eating out at places where tipping isn’t customary. Also for what it’s worth I only stay stateside a portion of the year, where else I stay tipping is unusual, not unheard of but definitely not a common thing people do. So in the end instead of 15% they get 0% because I didn’t go out to eat and of course the business owner gets $0.
Yeah, but you said you tip 5% for below average service. Are you aware of the state of the kitchen, the state of the dish pit, or the state of the running side work at all times? Because if you’re not, you have, at some point, stiffed a competent somebody doing their level best to keep the establishment from burning to the ground.
Who’s to say the issue was necessarily with the server. Dishes being dirty, or the food having issues wouldn’t be their fault. Also your assumption does really depend on the restaurant and how they manage tipping.
Sure but “getting something” implies you’re tipping, I’m talking about people who still go and do not tip.
If you tip, then yeah, that is indeed better for the server. What’s better for the server overall is getting to the point where you can escape the industry but of course it has its ways of keeping you locked in (and not all of them are “tips or the lack thereof”), but in the short term:
It’s like you didn’t read my comments at all. I never said anything about not tipping at all outside of the circumstance where I never went to the restaurant to begin with. If I don’t go then the owner gets $0 and the server gets $0 since I didn’t use their service or purchase their product aka they both get 0%.
The scenario you’re bringing up really has nothing to do with anything I’ve said this entire time.
Ok, I’ll run it back for you. Give me a minute to edit this all together, I’m on mobile.
You said:
I mostly decrease eating out which is arguably worse because now they get a 0% tip. If enough people avoid establishments that abuse tipping then the problem will solve itself.
To which I replied:
But they don’t have to work for you for free of you don’t go
As in while you’re giving them 0% tip, you’re also giving them 0% work to do, by not going to the establishment.
The problem is those who give them 0% tip and 100% work to do.
Sure but that wasn’t what I ever argued for. Doing work for no pay outside of a volunteer position or something like family is a bad situation no matter what.
But they don’t have to work for you for free if you don’t go, and you’re not actually subsidizing the restaurant if you’re not paying the menu price.
It’s for sure worse for the worker if you go, pay for your meal, and don’t tip them. The owner doesn’t care, he got his, and if the worker (who gets 0% in either scenario) quits another just takes their place tomorrow.
Maybe on an individual level but if no one goes there won’t be a restaurant or that job for long. Getting something is typically better than getting nothing.
Not as a server. No it’s not.
So getting a 15% tip is worse than getting no business at all?
Depends on the pay structure. Tip outs at some places get high, maybe even 10% of total sales. Which would mean 2/3 of your generous 15% tip goes to the kitchen, or the busboy, or whoever, regardless of how much your server had to harangue them into doing their jobs or how much verbal abuse everyone had to endure in the process. Which, as a former server, yes, is part of the job.
If you tip 5% at a place that tips out higher than 5%, guess where the difference comes from. If you guessed the server’s own share of the tip pool, you get a cookie. Sometimes, nothing is in fact better than something.
So why don’t they just get another job? It’s fuckin hard out there, man, maybe they’re trying. You don’t know. It took yours truly 2 years to escape the industry, and I still have a foot planted there because i took a pay cut to do it. I can almost guarantee I make less money than you if you can afford to eat out more than, like, once a month.
And don’t even get me started on the servers who do make beaucoup bucks. They don’t get there on their own, they do it by shirking their side duties, taking a bigger slice of the pie, and “delegating” to their peers, which management loves because it’s “team service.” Granted, the restaurant I worked at was a shitty place to work, but that’s not exactly rare.
So what does this all point to? Tipping sucks, but trying to fight it by tipping less really only hurts the face you see.
My issue isn’t with the service staff, it’s with business owners who are increasingly abusing their workers by offloading their pay onto tips. I mainly fight this by just not eating out or eating out at places where tipping isn’t customary. Also for what it’s worth I only stay stateside a portion of the year, where else I stay tipping is unusual, not unheard of but definitely not a common thing people do. So in the end instead of 15% they get 0% because I didn’t go out to eat and of course the business owner gets $0.
Yeah, but you said you tip 5% for below average service. Are you aware of the state of the kitchen, the state of the dish pit, or the state of the running side work at all times? Because if you’re not, you have, at some point, stiffed a competent somebody doing their level best to keep the establishment from burning to the ground.
Who’s to say the issue was necessarily with the server. Dishes being dirty, or the food having issues wouldn’t be their fault. Also your assumption does really depend on the restaurant and how they manage tipping.
Sure but “getting something” implies you’re tipping, I’m talking about people who still go and do not tip.
If you tip, then yeah, that is indeed better for the server. What’s better for the server overall is getting to the point where you can escape the industry but of course it has its ways of keeping you locked in (and not all of them are “tips or the lack thereof”), but in the short term:
Tip and work>no tip no work>no tip but still work
It’s like you didn’t read my comments at all. I never said anything about not tipping at all outside of the circumstance where I never went to the restaurant to begin with. If I don’t go then the owner gets $0 and the server gets $0 since I didn’t use their service or purchase their product aka they both get 0%.
The scenario you’re bringing up really has nothing to do with anything I’ve said this entire time.
Ok, I’ll run it back for you. Give me a minute to edit this all together, I’m on mobile.
You said:
To which I replied:
As in while you’re giving them 0% tip, you’re also giving them 0% work to do, by not going to the establishment.
The problem is those who give them 0% tip and 100% work to do.
Sure but that wasn’t what I ever argued for. Doing work for no pay outside of a volunteer position or something like family is a bad situation no matter what.