5 ms·

Can we take this opportunity to get rid of institutionalized tipping entirely? It is beyond me why this is even accepted, let alone expected behavior for compan

Can we take this opportunity to get rid of institutionalized tipping entirely? It is beyond me why this is even accepted, let alone expected behavior for companies to specifically ask for tips on behalf of workers. I traveled to several (developed) countries recently recently and was pleasantly surprised and relieved to not have to worry about tipping for each and every service.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
I can tolerate it but I don't understand why 20% is now regarded as "normal" for a basic level of service.
- lotsofpulp 8y ago
  It’s not, unless you want to signal how much money you’re willing to throw around.
- colechristensen 8y ago
  I have known plenty of smart, capable people who worked hard in the service industry and, frankly, deserve it. I don't like the idea of people working for my benefit earning starvation wages.
  - gamblor956 8y ago
    I understand why the kitchen staff deserves tips, they're the ones doing all the real work. I can't understand why the server who spends at most 2-3 minutes an hour taking the order and carrying it from the kitchen to the table deserves 20% of the bill. (In my area servers and kitchen staff now make the same standard minimum wage before tips, so it's especially obscene to demand 20% on top of the $12-$15/hour the server is already making for almost no work.)
    - colechristensen 8y ago
      I'd challenge you actually try to get to know some people working as waitresses and reevaluate your position about tipping on top of minimum wage being "obscene".
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
      - noselasd 8y ago
        People want the resturants to be run like they do in other parts of the world. In practice that means most items will costs 20% more than today, salaries for the waiters/waitresses are 20% higher than today, and customers are not expected to tip.
      - gamblor956 8y ago
        I actually know quite a few waitresses and others in the restaurant industry. I think you should actually try to get to know some of the people who do far more valuable work than taking orders and occasionally delivering plates to a table and who make less than waitresses, like social workers, janitors, and bus drivers. If you know enough of those people, you begin to question the entire moral justification for tipping waitresses or serving staff in the first place.
    - oasisbob 8y ago
      In many healthy restaurants tip culture goes beyond the frontline staff - servers and hosts will tip out the kitchen, bussers, etc at the end of the night. Friends I had in high school would make 2-3x minimum wage as bussers on busy nights. $2-3 per server per shift was pro forma, even on a quiet night.
      - astura 8y ago
        Which makes the whole thing very, very, very silly: People say you're supposed to tip based on "quality of service" (whatever that means?) and tips are an incentive to provide "good service"[1] (because obviously everyone who isn't tipped doesn't do their job?????) However, in practice if your server is an asshole and you don't tip you also stiff the host and bussers and bartenders. That's obviously profoundly unfair. Not to mention if you get bad service it's unlikely that it's your server's personal fault, restaurant service is a team effort and the quality of service is mostly a function of quality of management. [1] I don't see a functional difference between this and bribery.
  - drcode 8y ago
    We're not questioning whether they deserve to be fairly compensated for their labor, we're arguing whether that compensation should come from fair salaries provided by the employer or whether that compensation should be haphazardly dispersed in the form of tips.
  - j16sdiz 8y ago
    So the restaurant should increase their base salary?
adwww 8y ago
Now think how non-Americans feel when they travel to America. Tipping culture (alongside mass homelessness in some places) feels very awkward to me when I'm in America - I never know who I'm meant to tip, and a few times when I havn't offered one people have been really aggressive about it.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

I can tolerate it but I don't understand why 20% is now regarded as "normal" for a basic level of service.

lotsofpulp 8y ago
It’s not, unless you want to signal how much money you’re willing to throw around.
colechristensen 8y ago
I have known plenty of smart, capable people who worked hard in the service industry and, frankly, deserve it. I don't like the idea of people working for my benefit earning starvation wages.
- gamblor956 8y ago
  I understand why the kitchen staff deserves tips, they're the ones doing all the real work. I can't understand why the server who spends at most 2-3 minutes an hour taking the order and carrying it from the kitchen to the table deserves 20% of the bill. (In my area servers and kitchen staff now make the same standard minimum wage before tips, so it's especially obscene to demand 20% on top of the $12-$15/hour the server is already making for almost no work.)
  - colechristensen 8y ago
    I'd challenge you actually try to get to know some people working as waitresses and reevaluate your position about tipping on top of minimum wage being "obscene".
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - noselasd 8y ago
      People want the resturants to be run like they do in other parts of the world. In practice that means most items will costs 20% more than today, salaries for the waiters/waitresses are 20% higher than today, and customers are not expected to tip.
    - gamblor956 8y ago
      I actually know quite a few waitresses and others in the restaurant industry. I think you should actually try to get to know some of the people who do far more valuable work than taking orders and occasionally delivering plates to a table and who make less than waitresses, like social workers, janitors, and bus drivers. If you know enough of those people, you begin to question the entire moral justification for tipping waitresses or serving staff in the first place.
  - oasisbob 8y ago
    In many healthy restaurants tip culture goes beyond the frontline staff - servers and hosts will tip out the kitchen, bussers, etc at the end of the night. Friends I had in high school would make 2-3x minimum wage as bussers on busy nights. $2-3 per server per shift was pro forma, even on a quiet night.
    - astura 8y ago
      Which makes the whole thing very, very, very silly: People say you're supposed to tip based on "quality of service" (whatever that means?) and tips are an incentive to provide "good service"[1] (because obviously everyone who isn't tipped doesn't do their job?????) However, in practice if your server is an asshole and you don't tip you also stiff the host and bussers and bartenders. That's obviously profoundly unfair. Not to mention if you get bad service it's unlikely that it's your server's personal fault, restaurant service is a team effort and the quality of service is mostly a function of quality of management. [1] I don't see a functional difference between this and bribery.
- drcode 8y ago
  We're not questioning whether they deserve to be fairly compensated for their labor, we're arguing whether that compensation should come from fair salaries provided by the employer or whether that compensation should be haphazardly dispersed in the form of tips.
- j16sdiz 8y ago
  So the restaurant should increase their base salary?

adwww 8y ago

Now think how non-Americans feel when they travel to America. Tipping culture (alongside mass homelessness in some places) feels very awkward to me when I'm in America - I never know who I'm meant to tip, and a few times when I havn't offered one people have been really aggressive about it.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]