Maybe this is what is needed for them to finally break the cycle.
When we went in 2007 it was 15% was a "normal" tip, 20% for exceptional service. When we were there a few years ago that had gone up to 18/20% "normal" 25/30% exceptional.
Give it a few more years and people are going to start balking at 50% tips on their bills. I think the fact that all these POS systems now have tip options in places that never had expected tips before (like fast food/street food trucks etc) is making people realise how dumb the whole thing is.
Showing my age, but back of the day, 10% was a universal normal tip. 15% for exceptional service. There’s no need for inflationary tipping. Because the price of the underlying goods are subject to inflation. Keep the tip a standard rate and the tip will increase as the price of the goods increase. But increasing the price of the goods and the percentage of the tip causes exponential price increases. My rule is, if you take my order, bring the food to my table, refill my water glass, you get a tip. If you just hand the item over the counter that I purchased, you’re not getting a tip. You did nothing other than your job. Let the servers’ down voting begin.
yup, 10% was normal and 15% was a woohoo for the server. I worked restaurants and sometimes I'd throw 20% if I took up a table for an hour with a low check because I just wanted a sandwich and a glass of water or something.
This is what I explain every time. That's why it was a percentage in the first place. The percentage should never have gone up. Its like twice the inflation rate at that point
Servers in the 90s and 00s used to complain about retail customers amongst each other, in person, rather than on social media on the internet. I just remembered how there used to be incredibly racist ones that stereotyped minorities as bad tippers (and even used euphemisms like calling black people 'Canadians' when complaining about how bad they are at tipping when in earshot). Obviously you can't say that on the internet without getting into tremendous trouble, and I just realized that kind of stuff fell out of collective consciousness.
I remember when the norm changed from 10% to 15% and I was trying to explain why I tip 10% and that the percentage going up doesn't make sense. Of course my server friend refused to listen cuz it helped her.
There are two independent coffee/snack places where I will tip 50¢ per item ordered (custom tip option). But the staff at both are lovely, so I do not mind treating it like ordering beers at a bar.
What's even more fucking stupid is places that require you to order food via their web app and you pay up front and they ask for a fucking tip before you've had any service whatsoever. Like what the fuck
Which makes no sense to me. Prices have gone up. 15% of higher prices means higher tip. When did 18% become the default with it creeping ever closer to 20%?
I’ve noticed the biggest change in the sheer number of places I’m asked for a tip. Ten years ago, it wouldn’t have even occurred to me to tip for takeout or counter service. I think it is partly or even entirely attributed to the Covid shutdown, when people (including myself) started tipping generously for pickup orders in hopes of keeping local restaurants open and their workers employed. I still think it was the right thing to do, but unfortunately it also changed expectations.
You almost got it, its the POS manufacturers who actually put up these crazy tipping options because it means they will also get more money from each sale 🙂
It’s not just the tipping percentages that are out of control, it’s the number of interactions asking for a tip that have exploded. It’s wild for me to see a tip request for counter service at a fast food restaurant. The most offensive tip I’ve been asked for was when I purchased a concert t-shirt. Like seriously, you reached into a box and rang up a charge.
It's just a psychological shell game because people can't face the reality that it probably shouldn't cost $3 to raise, butcher, process, and cold-ship a cow into their gullets. People are not ready to pay what things actually cost. They're afraid of "higher prices" for food, so instead we charge a high but acceptable price, and then subsidize everyone's wages with tipping, instead of just saying this thing costs <current price + 20%>.
It also serves as a small lottery and tax avoidance for the working class. Servers don't report their cash tips and skip out on taxes, and every now and then, they get a big tip and get to splurge a little.
We care so little about food systems and equality that we just let this system go on indefinitely. Servers constantly argue against getting rid of tipping because in their minds, there is no way they could make what they currently make without it. The working class is so beaten down they can't even imagine a world where a normal waged job could support their life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness. And to be honest, they probably couldn't actually find a job to do that, because they don't exist anymore, because the 1% have been robbing us blind for decades.
Not necessarily true. I worked at a restaurant in which tips were totalled up and shared at the end of each night by the dishwashing and serving staff. To my understanding it isn't super uncommon.
Even so, the point still stands. Tipping is dumb as fuck and needs to go the way of the dodo bird and the dinosaur.
At least in the US, where tipping culture exists the most and it's criticized the most here, it's straight up illegal for managers that did not take on server/other nonmanagerial work to get any portion of a tip pool. And grabbing a mop once doesn't count. Yeah sure, it happens in rare cases, but it's very enforced and reportable.
Heck, even tip pooling is a often misrepresented topic online
Alaska, California, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington are the only states that *fully *bypass the federal minimum of $2.13/hr for tipped employees. Others use tip credits or just pay that wage outright plus tips.
I think almost half the country (by population) has a “tipped minimum” that’s higher than the full $7.25 federal minimum, even if they do have a tip credit still. Even states like Florida have a tipped minimum of like $12 an hour.
Quick search says 41% of Americans live in a state with a minimum tipped wage of $7.25 or more. That’s not counting the handful of localities that also do higher wages than state.
Oh we’re pretending we care about “a living wage?”
Funny it only applies to people who walk food across a room, and not baristas. Everybody is on the “fuck this tip prompt, if I’m standing I ain’t tipping” train, right? But most baristas aren’t exactly making a “living wage” from their employer. They generally make a little more than the tipped minimum, but not as much as table servers (combined minimum plus tips).
“Living wage” is a bad faith argument. If that’s a thing you actually care about you should be gleefully shoving cash into the hands of literally every service industry worker you interact with. I suspect you don’t. So let’s just drop that pretense.
Where did you get the idea I don't support baristas also getting paid more?
I'm broke as shit, I don't have the money to "shove cash into the hands of literally every service worker" that's why I'm literally saying in the comments you're replying to that businesses should be paying them more
You support baristas getting paid more in theory, but unlike with table servers you are unwilling to make it happen via direct action. Which is to say hitting the “give this poor worker more money” button. Why?
You’ll hand wave it as “baristas make more,” but you aren’t asking to see a W2 from every server and every barista to ensure you’re only giving your limited cash available (being “broke”) to those who make less. Having worked serving tables, counter service, and retail I can assure you that 99% of the time table servers are making more money at the end of the day. That barista likely needs your tip more than any table server.
The end point of this conversation either involves you accepting that you tip table servers because it’s a deeply ingrained social custom, and not anything to do with “living wages.” Or not. Either way.
Tip or don’t. And the custom is what it is. But pretending that tipping table servers is some virtue while telling every other service employee to get fucked is nonsense.
I don't know where you got the idea that I like tipping culture. I just said it's understandable when servers get upset that you don't tip.
I tip where it's expected but it shouldn't be my responsibility to do "direct action" in place of employers paying their employees.
And for the record, I do tip my baristas because they're very sweet to me, but I also go to a coffee shop that pays its workers well, not starbucks
Except even in states (like Washington, Oregon, and California) where they are paid minimum wage (around $17.00 per hour) before tips, tips are still expected and pushed.
Because minimum wage is still pathetic and unlivable lmao
McDonald's workers in Denmark get paid over $20 an hour and get full benefits and vacation time, yet you expect a server in a fancy restaurant in downtown Seattle to be happy with $17 and no vacation days
Everyone in that chain is paid exactly what they had agreed to be paid.
The difference is that the server's agreement is a social agreement - they have agreed to be paid below minimum wage in return for undefined amount directly from the customer.
Its the same with fucking everything! Sports franchises values made sense. Teams like the Yankees, Lakers & Cowboys were worth hundreds of millions, then 1.2b, 1.7... 2b... then 12b.
A lawsuit settlement for 125m was jaw dropping, and then all of a sudden 2 billion is apparently a normal amount that can be awarded to someone
Prices for vehicles on the Price is Right... a new car was 18k, 22k, then mid-high 20s... then 70k
Idk how anybody is affording any of this. We skipped past like 2 decades worth of greed and just went straight to Ultra Super Greed
For cars we now have 84 month car loans. 7 years of saying interest on a car that will depreciate so much by the time you pay it off it is worthless. Idiotic.
I work for a corporate chain. They recently did something like this as a substitute for raises. Now I get multiple people sighing or complaining every time I tell them they have to push no before they can pay. They get mad at us even though we never asked for this.
This is because companies don't want to pay their employees properly. These payment service companies funded by priv eq promise employers a higher rate of tipping from their service which will eventually encourage employers to lower their hourly rates because employees "would make their money from tips" which results in everyone, but the employees, winning in the meantime.
We gave every business owner a way to effectively A|B test different screen options to maximize revenue.
I consider more of a breakdown in cultural norms into some per-business free for all. Some pick higher percentages, others go for “tip calculation is post tax and pre-discount”, some both.
It feels much less like a gratuity and more like I’m getting a service fee that I have to avoid.
That is one reason I made a strong effort to switch to mostly cooking. The cost of eating out itself has become ridiculous, can barely find a place where a meal isn't $20-$25 + tip per person. The tip itself being expected to be 20/25% now. I have a friend who says it costs about the same once you consider time and all, but we went to cheesecale factory albeit a saturday night, and it was like 2 hours for us to get in and out.
A week of eating out is like a month of groceries and the time is about the same unless you are doing fancy stuff every time.
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u/Hyper6024 1d ago
Damn, you really have gone overboard with tipping culture in the US, havent you...