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WireTap

Tipping in America

By Talia Berman, WireTap. Posted April 17, 2006.


They are young, transient and a dime a dozen -- a look at the ways 2 million food servers survive and don't survive in the restaurant industry.
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Tipping in America

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Last Monday at lunch in a Spanish restaurant in New York City, server #228 earned $12. Tuesday at lunch, $14. Thursday night and Friday night: $480 total. On Saturday morning at lunch, she made $75. Last summer, in August, the slowest restaurant month of the year (except in vacation towns), she made less than $500 -- and didn't make rent.

Thanks to tipping, restaurant service is one of the most erratically paid professions in the United States. In some states, tips comprise 100 percent of a server's income, and all but seven have separate, decreased minimum wages for tipped employees. On the federal level, the minimum hourly wage for tipped employees is $2.15. In Kansas, it's $1.59.

With a wage this low, most or all of it is diverted to payroll taxes, leaving servers and often table bussers and food runners to survive on the whims of their wining and dining guests.

So how do servers survive? As it turns out, many of them don't -- servers have a greater turnover rate than virtually any other profession. Tipping is part of the problem, according to Michael Lynn, associate professor of Consumer Behavior at Cornell University's Hotel School and an expert on tipping norms and practices, "Part of it has to do with tipping itself. It's an unsure source of income. If you are a professional server making money on tips, it is difficult to establish credit ratings and to buy a house."

Lynn highlights the effect that high turnover rates have on the profession. "Because there is a high turnover, the practice becomes less efficient," she says. "The service can suffer when an employer says, 'I don't want to invest money in training servers who are not going to be around in a few months.' In this country, we have a generally more poorly trained workforce because of that turnover."

Currently, servers in this country are young, transient and a dime a dozen. In 2004, the U.S. Department of Labor reported a server workforce of 2.25 million. Around one-quarter of all food- and beverage-related workers are 16 to 19 years old -- about six times the proportion of all workers. The job of a server was rated as one of the top five private sector occupations with the highest number of job vacancies, indicating an extremely high turnover.

Anatomy of a tip

So what is average for a tip? The expected rate used to be 15 percent of the total bill, but these days, especially in urban areas, tips are much closer to 20 percent. According to Zagat Survey's 2006 Top Restaurant Survey, the average restaurant tip in the United States is 18.7 percent.

And where do the tips go? Servers invariably have to "tip out" -- pool together and share -- their nightly income with other service staff such as bartenders, bussers and runners, and often a coffee guy and bar back as well. A tip-out can be as much as 40 percent or as little as 10 percent. Each restaurant develops a unique method of division. Generally, but by no means without exception, bartenders are paid the most, then servers and runners, and then everyone else.

A server's income varies to an incredible degree. One server I interviewed said he makes around $45 a night. If that server worked five nights a week and took a month off a year, his annual income before taxes would be $10,800. On the other side of the spectrum, senior servers at top restaurants in New York City can make $100,000 a year -- or more.

Tipping for good weather forecasts and good looks

What is surprising is that, among the factors that determine how much money a server makes, quality of service is fairly insignificant. The Center for Hospitality Research at Cornell University, where Lynn works, found in a 20-year study that level of service explained only a miniscule two percent of the variation between tips. "Literally how sunny it is outside has the same impact on a tip as good service does," says Lynn. "The relationship between tips and service is weak enough that you have to really question the incentive for servers to give good service."

The Center for Hospitality Research lists a number of other factors that affect your tip, many of which are completely out of a server's control. Good weather, good moods and a piece of candy with the check are all important tip boosters. For the server, being attractive improves your tip, being a woman improves your tip, and being an attractive woman exponentially increases it.


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Talia Berman is a freelance writer who waits tables in New York City.

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Tip more: a great article
Posted by: Citizendeane on Apr 17, 2006 5:02 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
This is a wonderful article showing the reality of the restaurant and hospitality businesses. So long as these are the facts, we should TIP MORE than 20% and always THANK our servers for their service!

[« Reply to this comment] [Post a new comment »] [Rate this comment: 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5]

» RE: Tip more: a great article Posted by: VisionQuest
» Until a living wage - TIP MORE Posted by: Citizendeane
» RE: Until a living wage - TIP MORE Posted by: VisionQuest
Rampant denial
Posted by: Urstrly on Apr 17, 2006 5:15 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
In what other industry would we expect customers, rather than a business, to pay the wages of employes? I'm still surprised that many diners think that a tip is for "extra" service, when indeed it may be the server's principal income. One solution is to place a fixed service charge on the tab, as is the usual solution in Europe. But American servers will tell you that this will make their lives tougher because they'll have to pay income tax on wages they are accustomed to taking as cash.

One solution is to pay servers the minimum wage, assure that all workers have access to universal healthcare, and let them pocket the extra. There's no such thing as a free lunch, and many Americans remain in denial about the needs of the people who serve it. Next time you sit down at a restaurant, ask yourself if you're willing to pay the full cost of your meal—or do you want your server to subsidize it?

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» RE: Rampant denial Posted by: deha
» RE: ampant denial Posted by: Aussie Kim
Can be like family
Posted by: JPHickey on Apr 17, 2006 6:41 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Living for years in the resort town of Sedona, Arizona, and eating at the same restaurants time after time, I get to know the servers I really like, and a chemistry develops that is lot like family.

This attachment can become strong enough that I develop more loyalty to the server than to the restaurant. In fact if the server changes employers, I'll switch too.

I've seen poor management cause servers unnecessary distress time after time. Great things can happen when the management comes to understand just how important the motivational atmosphere can be. Over the long haul, I believe that the best restruarnt is also the best place to work. Putting people first can really add a lot of value to the dining experience. Attracting and hiring and keeping the best help is the key to success over the long haul.

Seeing great employees being treated like chattel is a sad state of affairs, indeed! Making depersonalization the certerpiece of the restaurant degrades the experience of the patrons as well as the servers, and does not bode well for the future of the enterprise. What a shame there can be so much covert mean-spiritedness and greed going on, when life could be so much more satisfying! The best servers are like family, not like revolving displays in the wiwdow of a meat-market!

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Nice to see this come to light
Posted by: epski on Apr 17, 2006 8:49 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
It amazes me, with all the servers and former servers out there, how few people know to tip properly. Years ago, I finally walked out on my bartending and serving job due to being stiffed by two different customers after providing excellent service. It just wasn't worth it anymore. The tip is a reflection of a guest's appreciation for our hard work. No money, no appreciation. Forget good service. I didn't want to serve at all without tips. I worked at a chain restaurant where I had to pool tips as a bartender, and tip out as a waiter, and I don't think customers realized that... Because of this, tipping out is not a fair policy to force on your servers. The guest, afterall, assumes the money is all going to the server.

That said, I have some friends who work as bartenders in some upscale L.A. venues, and they make more on one weekend night than I made in a whole week at that chain restaurant. I suppose the lesson is, you want money, you have to go where the money is.

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gathaiga
Posted by: gathaiga on Apr 17, 2006 9:37 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
When I tip a server I intend that tip for them. Being required to give part of their tips to others is BS.

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» RE: gathaiga Posted by: truly scrumptious
A Modest Proposal
Posted by: jmoore on Apr 17, 2006 10:12 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I seem to recall that in some restaurants the employees with the least customer contact (and therefore not in a position to "earn" tips) earn a better hourly wage than the servers. Therefore, being a dishwasher or busperson pays more than being a server or bartender. In such restaurants there is no tip-sharing. In other restaurants the servers rotate sections and swap in/out with the host/ess (or whoever it is that operates the phones and seats people) on a daily or weekly basis so everyone gets the higher-wage positions sometimes. My own food-service experience did not bear this out (I worked in a restaurant that was pretty much a cafeteria, and tips were discouraged), but maybe if such a system were more widespread then the practice of tipping in restaurants would not be such a touchy subject. Of course, the best solution would be to pay everyone an amount they can live on so the tips would truly be "to insure promptness."

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pooling tips and tipping out - the reality
Posted by: ssfelion on Apr 17, 2006 12:39 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The reality about pooling tips and tipping out is that servers subsidize much of the labor force within restaurants. I've served tables, off and on, for over 17 years now - in the beginning tips were strictly for the server, but that has greatly changed as restaurant owners have discovered they can insist that servers "tip out" other employees for sharing in the overall work of the restaurant. Originally, tipping out would be for "front of the house" staff, like bartenders and bussers. But now it isn't uncommon to have to tip out the dishwasher or even a cook. Often what is also happening, and not really reported in this article, is that the owner will reduce the hourly wage for the tipped out employee (often below minimum) because with the tips, the employee makes above minimum, but at the expense of the server who is the one "working the tables". So - ownership can reduce their labor costs greatly by getting a good portion of their workforce under minimum wage and requiring the server to tip out them out in order to subsidize their unwillingness to pay what they should.

Why do you think tip expectation has crept up to 20%? Because servers need the extra money to make a decent wage for themselves. The cost gets passed on somehow! I've consistently had to tip out 30% - 40%.

On top of that, the other change that has happened (over the past 17 years) is the federal rate of income you have to claim. Now that most people pay by credit card and employers can track your overall food sales, you are required to report at least 8% of your sales as tip income. I currently work in a place where I usually only take home around 10% because the large amount of expected tip out. I've had times the reported amount of tip by credit card is actually quite a bit more than I have to take home and I worry that this will send a red flag to the feds that I am underreporting - then what happens? I would have to push it back onto the employer as far as the 40% tip out rate! but I'm sure I'd still be the one under suspicion.

Even saying all of this and the consternation it creates, if you work in a busy, high-end restaurant you can make good money. That is why it's been hard for me to totally get away, I just keep going back for the extra cash in hand.

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little incentive
Posted by: cbishopp on Apr 17, 2006 1:21 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
As a waiter in San Francisco I can tell you that staff turnover is not an occupational hazard but a method to keep an undervalued workforce in check.
The understanding that another waiter is in line for a job will easily give an employer the inclination to deny health care, force shifts that offer little compensation, and require mandatory shifts for "buy-outs" and special events in the restaurant with little to no compensation as well.
God forbid you should leave town briefly and hope that you will get the same schedule when you return no matter how skilled you are, how loyal you are, or long you have been employed.
Customers always assume that the pay must be good "or else why would they do it?"
But what they don't realize is that a restaurant schedule might be the only thing a working single mother or a full time student can handle.
The worst "non-tippers" are often restaurant owners themselves who pay no regard to loyal, efficient staff.
Sadly, chefs who work on a line in the kitchen are paid even less because some restaurant owners will shop out illegal aliens from Mexico and South America (who are often extremely good but without workers rights) before they will offer a decent wage. Other times one will be "let go" if any form of criticism, constructive or otherwise, reaches the ears of owners or managers.
I was part of a restaurant that made several million dollars in it's first two years of business and the owners often thanked us for all our hard work and patience with their ill-conceived floor plan and extensive side work. Never was there any real incentive offered to reliable employees outside of being fired (or more commonly the famous "We are not firing you we just have reduced your shifts to just one or two a month") this way they avoid paying workers comp. taxes and fees while still getting rid of you.
The harder you work the less you seem to get.
Now, many of those waiters I worked with are out of the job or working another dead end job while those poor restaurant owners, who claimed they did not have enough money for raises or health care, have opened another restaurant and are hugely successful.
The Federal Government has become wise to tipping as well and often restaurant owners will shift tax burden to employees who are already under the poverty line.
In the end it's just another billion dollar industry kept afloat by smiling faces and hopes that one won't be fired for something insignificant.
So next time you get bad service (which will ruin any meal regardless of the quality of the food) please understand that more often than not, you are dealing with someone who has either no experience or someone who knows that they are in a postion of little respect to their employers.

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» RE: little incentive Posted by: Aussie Kim
Not all Bad
Posted by: jeydid on Apr 17, 2006 1:31 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Firstly let me say I have been a server for 12 years now, and this article does make some very good points. However, it does slant the story quite a bit.

The company I work for provided me with health insurance, dental insurance, disabilty insurance, life insurance, and vision insurance from the day I started. I get vacation pay, a flexible schedule, and was trained under a nationally recognized training program. All that being said, they pay me 2.13 an hour to wait tables. The company I work for is a large national chain, with an average meal price of about 13 bucks. I would guess I average between 10 and 15 dollars an hour in tips, which is alot better than what most jobs that don't require a degree pay. The article is right, after taxes and insurance premiums, I rarely see a pay check.

As for forcing restaurants to "pay a living wage", it really isn't practical. Restaurants firstly can't be required to pay more than minimum wage, which everyone knows is not a living wage. There is no way I would do this job for 5.15 an hour or whatever the min, is now. I do think our base pay should be half of the federal min. wage, the way it was prior to 1980, which was the last time the fedral min for tipped emplyees was raised I believe. I could be wrong about that though. Ultimately I think that the public just needs to be better educated on what tipping means to servers.

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» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: cbishopp
» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: jeydid
» I will eat there... Posted by: earthworm
» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: VisionQuest
» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: jeydid
» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: Aussie Kim
» RE: Not all Bad Posted by: jeydid
My first job was a busser, and this is sooooo sad...
Posted by: morningstar777 on Apr 17, 2006 4:05 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I was 15 years old, and working as a busser back in 1988. My starting salary was 2.25. It was my first job. I worked for a classy restaurant, and it wasn't uncommon for me to bring home between 50-100$, at least, on the weekends. I worked my tail off for that job, and they repaid me by laying me off 10 months later. never missed a day, I was never late.
almost 20 years later, the wages are still 2.25.
great if you would like to open your own restaurant, bad if you want to work for the restaurant.
tips should be in addition to a waitresses wages. they work hard for the tips. I would never dream of going back into the field because of the employers wages.
with a decent wage, as per say, 10$ an hour, not this minimum BS, this wouldn't even be an issue. pay 25% of your tips to the Government, and feed yourself and your family. then you would actually be making 15-20$ an hour.
besides, when I goto a restaurant, and they serve me a really good meal, and clean up my mess, and wait on me hand and foot, I would expect to pay top dollar for top service. Eating out in a restaurant is a luxury, not a right. And, at the end of my meal, I always leave a very fat tip for my waitress as a thank you, and yes, regardless of service. They deserve it, and much more.

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Do like I always do........
Posted by: Diecash1 on Apr 17, 2006 5:52 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Whenever I go out to eat, I always tip in cash, typically 20% if the service is decent. This affords the waitperson a small bit of flexibility for reporting tip income.

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My Preferance
Posted by: thatManiack on Apr 17, 2006 8:22 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I don't feel that wage-tips should be a percentage of the meal ordered. It doesn't properly reflect the work done.

I would prefer that restaurants increase the prices of their food and pay, at least, the minimum wage to their employees and discourage their clientele from tipping for substandard to mediocre service.

This puts the responsibility of hiring competent workers on the management rather than forcing the cliental to do their work for them.

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» RE: My Preferance Posted by: LPB
Tipping inhuman
Posted by: Bobsays on Apr 19, 2006 4:11 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
The restaurant and hospitality business needs to clean its act up. It is raw exploitation of the worst kind. We don't really need all these restaurants, and if they can't economically survive on paying staff properly, then they shouldn't be there. I live in Europe, where wait staff are paid much better. We tip if we are very happy with the service, but otherwise it is not the main portion of their income.

Food in the restaurants tastes nicer than anything I've had in a Denny's so I don't see what the point is in having this whole industry ripping staff off.

At one time in history tipping used to be un-American. It used to be seen as undignified and offensive to the wait staff. How did we lose that?

There is a good commercial that ran here in Europe. An English couple is checking out of a US hotel. The fake perky receptienist (a deadringer for Winnona Ryder) details there expenses - mini bar, video, room service - and then she says in a sacharin voice 'oh, did you love the sunset from your window?' - the couple respond 'yes!'. She then taps into the computer 'one sunset, twenty dollars'. That sums up the US for me.

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A Living Wage For All
Posted by: NoPCZone on Apr 19, 2006 7:25 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
This whole article is just another reason that no jobs should be excluded from minimum wage laws. The whole idea that a worker's income is at the mercy of someone else's whims is insane.

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Tip wages = Slave wages
Posted by: jeffrey7 on Apr 19, 2006 8:21 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Jobs that have 'tips' in their payroll system are both scurge and aide to the low income worker. Scurge,because the employer only has to pay you $2.50/hr and Aide because you wind up with a 'little' folding cash to get some food with if you're lucky.
I pay tips if the service is good or not. Why? Because I know what it's like to be treated like a slave for low wages and understand how that can mess with a person. Now that's only at eateries that I have the ability to tip on my own.
Anyplace that forces a tip on you is really saying to the public "We pay our People shit,so we're tagging you to make us feel better." So I refuse to pay them! I ask what they pay their waitstaff. If they pay them well,I don't tip. That does'nt happen very often. Even the best eaterie pays the staff dirt.
What all this really points to is that there are'nt enough
'Living Wage Jobs'. There's plenty of barely-getting-by-almost-starving to work jobs. But few Living Wage Jobs.
Until we get living wage jobs for the People,we are slaves to the rich and not anything that resembles a Democracy.

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What's the matter with paying your workers
Posted by: popsicle67 on Apr 19, 2006 10:02 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I don't know where your from but in Oregon servers get a wage and the tips are just extra. An employer cannot use tips for wages here. Is this absurd practice really the norm where you are? Huh, and I thought we were supposed to be backwards out here.

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oregon minimum wage
Posted by: rwoolley on Apr 19, 2006 10:36 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I guess you don't remember the big fight here last year about the minimum wage in Oregon. The restaurant industry wanted tipped employees exempted from the voter-approved law to increase the minimum wage and peg it to inflation (passed in 02). They claimed that if they were able to pay servers less, they could pay "back house" staff more. Restaurants lost on this issue. Oregon is actually quite progressive on the issue of wages, not backwards at all.

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I Must Admit That...
Posted by: Wacre on Apr 19, 2006 10:38 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I generally tip more to a waitperson that I consider to be attractive than one that I don't; though that I try to tip at least 20%, regardless of what the person serving me looks like as a general sort of rule.

That being said, I might tip 15% for a waitperson that comes off pushy or rude, which is more dependent upon my own mood sometimes than theirs. I realize the dealing with the general public can be very, very trying, so anyone that can do so on a regular basis without throttling someone deserves some sort of recognition, and sometimes one doesn't feel all that great; so as long as a particular server isn't overly negative or particularly hostile, then I don't usually care all that much.

That being said, as a person of color, I bring my own baggage to the whole restaurant experience (the disconcerting feeling sometimes that white people that enter the restaurant at the same time are being seated and served first--I don't necessarily claim such feelings are valid, though I am enough of a realist to know that I shouldn't dismiss them off-hand either) so I tend to be a bit less critical of people serving me.

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» RE: I Must Admit That... Posted by: Aussie Kim
why should I tip?
Posted by: jpinder on Apr 19, 2006 11:28 AM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
Why should I tip? Nothing against the waiters, it’s just that I don’t get a tip for every call I answer in the office, I had a minimum wage job cleaning cars, no tips! What is it about that industry compared to others that you deserve a tip? It says on the menu $20 for a meal not $23. Restaurants should put the extra 15% in the cost of the meal as indicated on the menu then everybody is happy. It’s just another way to show a lower price for higher profits, cruise ships are the worst, so we’re all idiots I suppose. I tip, but I feel I should stop because it is not fair for us, the customer.

The reason why waiters get little or no pay is because of the waiters themselves. I’m sure that in the past waiters used to get paid more but then they started accepting tips, then restaurant owners caught on and decided hey, they make enough money from tips so let’s reduce their pay, logical? Now, after this little piece of info, again, why should I tip?

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» RE: why should I tip? Posted by: Daniel Shays
» RE: why should I tip? Posted by: Aussie Kim
» Don't tip! Posted by: oldsmobile
» How interesting..... Posted by: RoxanneDuBree
Why the Star of David?
Posted by: stahl on Apr 19, 2006 12:40 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
As a former racist I couldn't help but notice the simularity between the star in the illustration and the Star of David. In combination with the story, it brings to mind the phrase "Jewed down" which is a racist phrase no matter how you try to spin it.

Of all places I'd expect to find that kind of (indirect) reference, Alternet wasn't one of them.

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» RE: Why the Star of David? Posted by: scryberwitch
» RE: Why the Star of David? Posted by: jeydid
I agree
Posted by: lunag1rl on Apr 19, 2006 4:36 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
I waited tables for one summer at a family eatery/ice cream place. They demanded nearly all my evenings and weekends, making it impossible to spend time with anyone who had an office job (like, say, my girlfriend). I smelled like sour milk all the time, because they would only give me one shirt and after a while the smell just couldn't wash out. The worst part, though? I felt, literally, like a prostitute. I had to snivel and scrape and jump for anyone who was sitting at a table, trying desparately to please them, and I rarely got more than $3 a table. My most lucrative night, I got the front house section on a Saturday in July (usually reserved for a long-time employee, one of the only benefits). I worked for twelve hours with no break, no dinner, no nothing, and made about $100. I once received a $5 tip on a $10 check, and I was thrilled, even though I KNEW he'd left me that tip because he'd been staring at my breasts like he owned them. It's the worst job in the world. It gave me nightmares. When I eat out, I tip as well as I can afford to. If I won the lotto, I would go around leaving $100 tips. I am always nice to my server. But I would never go back to waiting tables. If I had needed to pay rent, make a car payment, anything other than saving money for sudy abroad in the fall, I would have been living in the street or on a friend's couch. It's no way to ask anyone to live, and it should, at least, pay minimum wage.

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Aussies and Kiwis
Posted by: may261989 on Apr 19, 2006 11:36 PM   
Current rating: Not yet rated    [1 = poor; 5 = excellent]
As a Kiwi living in Australia, I felt quite guilty after my trip to America as a young lad of 21 some years back.
I was ignorant to the whole tipping thing ( at the time tipping was very much a thing only the rich did or if you fancied one of the waitresses ...to this day in Western Australia nobody does it )
I remember going with my girlfriend to a pizza restuarant in L.A , had a great time with the waiters/ress' but left on a very sour note after we simply rounded up the bill by a dollar ( thinking we were being generous) . One of the staff actually yelled at us as we left. I did not know at the time that servers in America survived on tips alone. In Australia we have a minimum wage of about $13 p.h. no matter what the job, employers will often skim the tips of their employees - hence when I tip here I ask "is it going to you or your boss". At the very least over here a server will go home with 60or 70 bucks minimum even if it is a really quiet night.
Time to introduce a minimum wage guys and save us foreigners from embarrassing ourselves.
20% ??? holy shit!

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» RE: Aussies and Kiwis Posted by: Aussie Kim
Tax?
Posted by: Aussie Kim on Apr 19, 2006 11:44 PM   
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If these poor bastards are making most, if not all, of their money from tips, do we assume they don't pay tax?

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» RE: Tax? Posted by: jeydid
Realities in the Restaurant Industry
Posted by: mama_jess on Apr 21, 2006 5:56 AM   
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I've noticed a lot of demonizing of restaurant management in these comments. I've worked as a server for many years, and am now in the process of opening my own restaurant. While I agree that tipping isn't the best way for a server to make a living (although I've had tipped jobs that paid very well), it simply isn't feasible for restaurant owners to pay their employees a living wage, in most cases. Restaurants have huge overhead, and with a culture of fast food in this country, customers expect "value" in their meals, which leads to lower quality food, as restaurants ended up getting their ingredients from conglomerates like Sisco or Northcenter. Restaurants on average make 3-4 cents profit per dollar of sales, and that's a profitable restaurant!

I'm trying to build a business that focuses on serving local organic food in season, puts money into the local economy, supports local artists and craftspeople, and garners my employees a decent living. I'm not sure if I can do that, and not go under. This is a sad comment on priorities in our country, that we spend less than 10% of our earnings on food, and many of us would rather buy a Value Meal at a fast food joint than eat wholesome food delivered with a smile by a well-paid server.

Generally, to be profitable, a meal sold by a restaurant has to have a food cost of about 30%. That means that whatever the ingredients cost for that meal, you have to multiply that cost by three to get your sale cost. I'm looking into serving locally grown salads at my restaurant. Organic mesclun mix costs about $8/lb wholesale in my area, or .50/oz. For a salad with 3 oz of greens that's a food cost of $1.50 just for the greens. Add other vegetables, cheese, nuts, salad dressing...that salad ends up costing me $3 to make. That means I have to sell that salad for $9 to make a profit. Unfortunately, I can also buy organic mesclun mix off a truck from california (3000 miles away) for $3.50/lb...lowering my costs significantly, but not in line with my desire to support that local farmer.

I ramble on, but my point is, the answer to this problem isn't to say "evil restauranteurs...they should pay their servers better!" It's not that simple, and I've worked on both sides of the kitchen.

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With tipping, the employer no longer exploits the employee
Posted by: billyg946 on Apr 22, 2006 9:21 AM   
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It seems to me that the tipping culture, as practiced in the US, is a perfect scam for displacing the exploitation relationship from employer-employee to customer-server. If a server (employee) is underpaid and exploited, it's not the owner's (employer's) fault but the customers', which become the "tight, stingy, cheap, inconsiderate, racist, sexist, etc." exploiters. If they are foreigners or tourists, our tipping culture can provoke expressions of xenophobia, racism, etc.

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Star of David?
Posted by: billyg946 on Apr 22, 2006 9:24 AM   
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That's not a star of David, by the way.

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Ah yes, I remember.
Posted by: kmeyer on Apr 23, 2006 5:29 PM   
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I remember the manager who stole my credit card tips. I remember the many many, higher percentage than you think who just didn't tip at all, and were welcomed back by management. I remember bussers, bartenders, dishwashers taking me to task for a low (but totally honest) tipout. I remember negative paychecks. This system makes little sense, but who would eat out if everything on the menu cost 20% more? Restaraunt prices are already fairly absurd. Just another symptom of an inflated cost of living trying to match wits with a steadily lowering income.
Still, some fun times working that restaraunt.

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