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Damn, tips used to be given after a job well done not before.
Tips may have been that way a hundred years ago but I've been in the restaurant industry in the US for over 15 years, and for the duration tips have been used as a means to offload labor costs to the customer. They are not optional for the majority of people who work for tips, they are the difference between paying bills and not.
The practice is antiquated and should be completely removed as the standard way to compensate restaurant workers. But the thing that anti tippers always seem to miss is that the labor costs will still be there and the owners are not going to take it out of their cut. The menu prices will per force go up when companies get rid of tips. The same people will be complaining about that just as loudly, I'm willing to bet.
As I said in another comment, it's a bad system, but if you don't tip, you're a bad person.
labor costs will still be there and the owners are not going to take it out of their cut
That's where you're not only wrong, you've become part of the problem by claiming that.
Amen, there are so many places in the world where you can directly compare pricing and see that not only is it usually cheaper when this horseshit greed system isnt involved, but the customers/workforce is happier with the end product.
That said, if you do not tip in the US for servers/employees not compensated, you're an asshole. Boycotting the person trying to feed themselves rather than the company as a whole only makes a difference in that it makes you more of an asshole.
Yes the correct and honorable thing would be for the employer to absorb the costs but this is America we're talking about. We're currently going through record inflation almost purely because of corporate greed. These companies saw an opportunity to blame their massive price increases on COVID/labor costs/ materials cost even though these are only small factors. Yet year over year they're increasing profits. I have zero doubt that if they switched away from tipping systems that they would use that to falsely justify price increases.
They very well might here. But I think it would be a win. I worked in US restaurants for a long time in many positions and think it would be a win for the customer and employees. Customers, it would be an upfront cost, and you wouldn't have to worry about whether your server can eat although they serve food all day every day. Employees, get to eat and know for sure they will be able to later. If the consumer is paying that cost regardless, might as well codify it.
Then why can I, as a student, afford to go out to eat in a non-tipping country?
Different things are different, I'm talking about the United States
I know. But often Americans say that eating out can’t be affordable if it weren’t for tips. The rest of the world seems to prove otherwise, that’s my point.
That is not relevant to the subject at hand, because the cost of living and social support systems vary so widely between the US and the rest of the world. Without knowing anything else about your locale, I can only speculate that your restaurant industry is either far more exploitative than the US and keeps prices low by underpaying workers, or the people who profit from the businesses are slightly less greedy and allow a more generous portion of the budget to be allotted for pay.
more exploitative than the US
🤣
The US, famous for it's suicide nets to stop restaurant employees from jumping into the fryers, couldn't possibly be matched for exploitation of workers by any other current country. The notion that other countries could be more exploitative is laughable, in fact.
Hang on a second, I'm being passed a note..
Well this is embarrassing, it turns out those suicide nets are on Apple's China factory, where the 996, or 9a-9p 6d/w, work schedule is quite the norm.
the prevalence of iPads with 20,22,25 percent tips for a coffee is having me question the entire practice for sure.
im also seeing reataurants operating server robots now. for those I only tip 10%.
Yeah and before the Ipads it was a little jar with the word "tips" on it, but nobody uses cash anymore so they have to ask for that $1 (are coffees still $5? Mine is $2.95 so it's $0.59) digitally now. Of course, the robot probably isn't worried about making rent this month so it's probably safe not to tip bots, but I don't mind sliding a dollar to the nice girl providing me the happy juice. If I did I'd just make coffee at home or stop at the gas station and serve myself though, I wouldn't go to a place with a human that expected a tip. Idk, if I'm going to force someone to suffer I'd rather just eat the bullet and drink shitty gas station coffee than be the 100th person to symbolically tell someone to fuck themselves and die this morning while they contemplate if they'd rather pay the power bill or get groceries this week but that's just me.
I think it is somewhat better than people who pay workers directly. Cutting out the owners is good; tipping isn't a sound system, but overall, not paying via a middleman (owner) seems like the best path.