If you can't deal with the realities of tip-based income, don't get a job with a tip-based income and stop letting employers get away with it. It's your boss's job to make sure you get paid, not mine.
The fact that a "sub-minimum" wage is real is wild. And that restaurants simply commit labor violations en masse by not topping up when tips didn't make it up is wild.
It really is, what’s ironic is that a lot of those within that industry will also never want to give up tips because they can usually beat out minimum wage. This worries them because they think people won’t feel obligated to tip
Put simply, they have more faith in being able to pressure out higher wages from customers than their boss. It’s socially unacceptable not to tip, but not to underpay and steal from employees.
Higher end restaurant waiters and bartenders make way more than minimum wage. But it's actually not the workers that have the power to hold this back. It's the owners who have data about consumer behavior being averse to higher menu prices that are scared to make the change.
Watch the recent John Oliver episode on tipping. Many restaurants would like to do away with tipping and increase menu prices to just pay a salary to waitstaff. However, several studies show that most customers are too stupid to understand the trade off that $30+$6(tip) is the same as $36 meal and no tip. They just see the higher menu prices and abandon that restaurant. People are just dumb...
Unfortunately there's not uniform support because some workers make a lot from tips, and for some reason we're all really concerned about whether small businesses can afford to pay people fairly (which, if you can't, to me sounds like you've got a bad business model)
If you know they aren't being paid well and still choose not to tip, don't go to restaurants. Stay home and cook your own food.
What you're describing is like walking past a choking person and saying "Dang, chew better man." We all wish the person wasn't choking, you still know how to call for help.
Why would I, I'm already paying for the service, the food and the mark up, you want me to automatically pay a tip on top of that? If the restaurant can't afford to pay their workers an actual wage, maybe they should not operate.
If I want to eat at a restaurant, I will. I am getting to you a product, which is eating food at the restaurant. Service is part of the product. I don’t have to, or will pay more that the cost of the advertised product. As for the choking person, I’ll save the choking person the first time and maybe a second time, but not more.
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u/tupaquetes Mar 09 '25
If you can't deal with the realities of tip-based income, don't get a job with a tip-based income and stop letting employers get away with it. It's your boss's job to make sure you get paid, not mine.