Why We Tip

1. Lo
   October 12th, 2008 at 3:07 am

   There’s also the fact that servers get paid less than minimum wage and that after taxes and, if they’re lucky, insurance, their paychecks are usually void. They live on their tips. They are also taxed on what they would make off of each table, if that table tipped 10%. Please remember when you DON’T tip, your server is paying for the privilege of serving you.

   Note: this is only here in the US, as far as I know. Most countries make their restaurants pay their employees fairly, which ups the cost of the bill.

   Before anyone asks, no I’m not a waitress. My mother was when I was younger, so I was always taught the importance of tipping.

2. Jane
   October 12th, 2008 at 5:14 am

   I thank god that I live in Australia where I don’t have to worry about tipping everytime I dine out.

3. BOLL
   October 12th, 2008 at 6:45 am

   Same in Sweden, just pay up and that’s it, especially when you pay with your card and there is no change to get rid of. It did make me puzzled when I was in NY though, how much? When? How? Haha.

4. Kevin
   October 12th, 2008 at 7:14 am

   We pay because we know that most waiters, waitresses making their living on tips. They get pay a low low low hourly fee, and if they don’t get tipped, they don’t have money to live on.

   Having said that, I do not tip for bad service. If the person waiting my table isn’t doing their job, they aren’t going to get payed for it.

   I used to do this thing where I knew about how much the cost of the meal would be. Then I’d figure out the tip, and put it at the end of the table. Anytime the waiter or waitress fucked up (that wasn’t an accident) money was removed from the table. There were many times the waiter/waitress had noticed this. It often leads to better service.

   People also tip because well, it’s just good manners. And it rewards those doing a good job. Something that seems to be an American thing only? Who knows.

   I’ve seen foreigners say “I don’t believe in tipping” and don’t tip.

   But say it was the other way around. In Europe say, it was the way they did things. And a bunch of Americans came over and never tipped because we didn’t do it. We would get BLASTED for being so insensitive to European culture and being cheap.

   Funny how there are two sets of rules for the same happenstance.

5. Pol x
   October 12th, 2008 at 7:16 am

   Same in the UK.

   Sure I’ll tip if the service4 has been good and friendly, but that’s all.

   If they just put a plate infront of you and trudge off… well I could do that myself.

   IN the UK they get paid a wage, as they do in Australia too, so don’t rely on the tips as their actual income.

   I’m with Mr Pink on this one

6. AlisonCJ
   October 12th, 2008 at 7:45 am

   I tip the way it was intended - based on service. If the service is great, we’ll sometimes tip 50-80%. Conversely, if the service is awful, then I don’t tip. That’s the rule - if you’re okay with not tipping bad service, then you have to also be okay with over-tipping exceptional service.

   I’ve heard a lot of people say that they feel obliged to tip because of the lower wages of waitresses, but the issue here is that the entire reason that they have it set up like that (lower wages + tips instead of just a regular wage and no tips) is to encourage good service (i.e. do a good job and you’ll make more money). By tipping bad service, you’re letting your server know that they can do a bad job and still make the same amount. I do my job to get my salary, just like they should do theirs.

7. JivesTheButler
   October 12th, 2008 at 7:48 am

   Yay for data-driven social policy! I am encouraged by the increasing degree to which people cite good data when making monetary policy decisions, even in their private lives or small businesses.

   And yet… I tip. I would like to say it is because I want to help out my working class brethren who are paid an unfairly low wage, but at the end of the day it might just be social norms causing me to go for my wallet.

   I can tell you one thing though, as I am living in France right now, tipping was pretty effectively eliminated here. It might take something like the mandatory service charge law to change the norm in America.

   Either that, or mandatory tip pooling with non-managerial staff, which I am also a fan of.

   Still though, it’s like they say, you get what you pay for. Whether that is more attention from the wait staff or decreased efficiency from discouraging the kitchen staff, it still holds true.

8. Sofar
   October 12th, 2008 at 8:23 am

   This whole thing dates back to like the eighteenth century. It used to be barmaids weren’t paid anything for their services, they were just given room and board at the inn in which they worked. Tips were their pocket money.

9. rob
   October 12th, 2008 at 8:34 am

   Modern tipping is backwards. Originally a tip was offered before the meal…thus tips meaning “to insure proper service”

10. ted
    October 12th, 2008 at 8:54 am

    Still laughing at Kevin’s tipping method. That’s one way to guarantee they’ll spit in your food.

    Or AlisonCJ - I sometimes tip 80%. That’s just way overcompensating for something - don’t know what, but you must be eating really cheap food to do that.

11. Paul in Boca
    October 12th, 2008 at 9:59 am

    Ted,
    Notice Kevin said “used” to do…perhaps he stopped that procedure the time he actually discovered the phlegm…

12. Leon
    October 12th, 2008 at 10:00 am

    I know one thing:
    You leave a penny for a tip because of bad service and it gets their attention.

13. Kevin
    October 12th, 2008 at 10:40 am

    “Modern tipping is backwards. Originally a tip was offered before the meal…thus tips meaning “to insure proper service”

    Do you get payed a week before you work? Of course not. That would be absurd. What if you call off 2 days during that time you got payed already?

    “Still laughing at Kevin’s tipping method. That’s one way to guarantee they’ll spit in your food.”

    I did this before society went to that level. Besides, if someone is doing their job, no money gets removed. And very few times did I have to do such a thing. And most of the waiter/waitresses that did get it, fully knew why, and it wasn’t just me being a dick.

    Like for example if I asked for refills (you should never have to ask) And I don’t get them, but see the person that is waiting on me, jib-jabbing for 5 minutes with someone before forgetting to get my refill, they will get a dollar removed. And rightfully so.

    This works well still BTW at buffets. They aren’t going to spit in everyone’s food.

    And to comment on this.

    “And yet… I tip. I would like to say it is because I want to help out my working class brethren who are paid an unfairly low wage, but at the end of the day it might just be social norms causing me to go for my wallet.”

    Don’t let “social norms” effect the way you do things. Do them because it’s the right thing to do.

    We need the right thing to do to start being the social norm.

14. JenDiggity
    October 12th, 2008 at 10:54 am

    Knowing that waiters are taxed on their estimated tips (not sure if that’s just something in California or not) it’d be a real dick move to not tip just because I “don’t believe” in tipping. I tip if the service is decent, a standard percentage, but do increase it or decrease it based on out-of-the-ordinary service. It’s a reward system. If you tip them ahead of time they can still give you crappy service despite being given a tip. I want to make them EARN a little extra. I am paying for service so they should be rewarded based on their service and if they do an awful job yet still have to pay taxes on tips they didn’t get then maybe they’ll step up their game. As far as “low wages”, in my state they are making at least minimum wage plus tips (that they often have to share with the cooks and buspersons), but in Arizona it can be something ridiculous like $2.50 per hour because they assume they’ll be getting tips. Now THAT is messed up. Of course, people have a choice as to the jobs they choose…

15. Zombie79
    October 12th, 2008 at 11:03 am

    “It is embarrassing to have another person wait on you,” the psychologist Ernest Dichter told a magazine reporter in 1960.

    Um, no it’s not. I don’t go out to eat and pay $150 to have to get my own drinks and bus my own table.

16. Anise
    October 12th, 2008 at 12:02 pm

    I tip because I care that another human being needs me to tip them. But I’m a social worker, so I’m funny that way.

17. Christophe
    October 12th, 2008 at 12:36 pm

    Try service a French restaurant on the Mediterrannean coast during summer months and you’ll wish you could substract some of the cost…

    When I was living in the US I always appreciated the opportunity of rewarding the ‘experience’ with the right amount of $. It really felt like I was paying the right price. I was always a good tipper, but if the ‘experience’ was just average, the 15% did it. Only a couple of times I left only a 10% tip (for the cooks/busboys).

    Mandatory tipping with bad service means you’re getting ripped off. I want my voice to be heard.

18. David B
    October 12th, 2008 at 12:55 pm

    Tipping is a strange custom. We tip according to the price of our meal, usually a percentage. Does the dinner waitress deserve more money than the lunch waitress because dinner costs us more than lunch? Does it require less effort to bring me a burger than it does to bring me a steak? If the service is equal why do we give each waitress say 15%? Shouldn’t we give each a specific monetary amount instead? There are other variables too such as tip sharing with the bar tender (and that includes getting soft drinks in some restaurants) and bus help. You can really over think the whole tipping thing but as was pointed out, at least here in California, waitressing and in some cases other professions, tipping is figured into the wages and taxes so yes I tip. Anywhere from 5% for lousy service, to 25% for excellent service. However I still know some people that don’t ever tip or some that always leave $2.00 no matter what the bill is.

19. TheDiversePurse
    October 12th, 2008 at 1:10 pm

    I’ll tip depending on the service. And it’s somewhat unfortunate when servers have to share tips (like at Starbucks etc) especially when some are super nice and efficient while others seem like they’d rather be watching The Hills.

20. Josh
    October 12th, 2008 at 1:49 pm

    If the service is good then they get a real good tip. If not they wont get a tip at all.

    Here is a example of what I mean by a bad service. I went to a restaurant once and the lady we got as our server had to be one of the worst of all time. She actually dropped a pitcher of tea on a guy at another table. She rarely ever showed up at the table so we went without the check and drinks pretty much the whole time. Our server did not bring out checks, drinks, food etc. The only time we got decent service is when another server took up her slack. The other server got a tip while the one we had got nothing. We paid the bill and bailed out.

    She was only waiting on 3 tables. She hung out in the back when she was not spilling something on someone she is suppose to be waiting on.

21. ted
    October 12th, 2008 at 2:17 pm

    “I did this before society went to that level. Besides, if someone is doing their job, no money gets removed. And very few times did I have to do such a thing. And most of the waiter/waitresses that did get it, fully knew why, and it wasn’t just me being a dick.”

    Sorry, sounds like dick-like behaviour. And if they’re willing to spit in one person’s food, what’s to stop them from spitting in an entire buffet? They take baths in the sink at Burger King.

    Your description makes it sound like the ego-boost mentioned in the article. An insecure person would use the tip to gain power over another person and control their behaviour.

    “Fly my monkeys, fly!”

22. doctorcaligari
    October 12th, 2008 at 3:31 pm

    Under Federal Law, if what you make after tips does not equal minimum wage, then the employer has to cover the rest. If your employer is telling you otherwise, then they can be investigated. They are also supposed to post a notice somewhere in the restaurant telling you this. The poster has been at every job I have worked at.

    What I have seen most often is that wait staff don’t want to report their actual tips, so they won’t have to pay taxes on them. And if they happen to fall below minimum wage, they are screwed because they can’t suddenly report their employer without alerting the IRS to their own transgressions.

23. skfary
    October 12th, 2008 at 4:21 pm

    I tip because I’ve waited tables myself. Enough said.

24. NoTippingNoRegrets
    October 12th, 2008 at 4:49 pm

    If all the arguments for tipping equals better service, every industry, from dentists, doctors, and heart surgeons, to judges, news anchors, and every politician in office and running for office. Unfortunately for customers, tipping is not just disallowed, it’s actually frowned upon. Clearly, we would all be getting better service from all sectors if only we could “tip them accordingly”.

    The same argument also falls flat when you consider the kitchen staff. Most restaurants should have atrocious food because customers don’t tip them. By the same argument, it’s a wonder any of it is edible and that all the minimum wage kitchen staff don’t pee on your food before you get it.

    And rarely do tipping supporters ever get militant about upping tipping expectations to include kitchen staff which also includes minimum wage staff, leaving the argument as one of elitism that values public service work more than non-public service work.

    If that’s not enough, the biggest fallacy to the good tips equals better service argument is how most people, whether they’re the tipper or the tippee, simply do not equate low tips to poor service. They equate it to stingy, low-life customers, the “bad tippers”, so much so that it’s already a long-standing, socially ingrained, and psychologically embedded stereotype that simply assumes that service is always good.

    In a regulated system such as the Linkery, the tips are accounted and included as the income that it is and taxed accordingly, taxes which pay for society’s social services, taxes that society is expected to simply overlook, even by social reformers. While regulating in this way helps solve the economic fallacy of tipping, it still fails to solve the fallacious argument of service quality, which remains unregulated.

    The biggest problem of service quality is it’s never defined. Although there’s a general air about certain establishments offering more, and others offering less, it’s still really anybody’s call. This works well for everyone but the customer.

    Some standards I expect:

    1. Cheerfulness - there’s no excuse for sullenness, surliness, or “attitude” while on the job. I don’t expect servers to be perfect or effuse a Disneyesque sense of optimism. A simple and professional sense of decorum will suffice. But if they can’t park their issues and emotional content off my dinner table, I shouldn’t be expected to park my money in their wallet.
    2. Anonymity - if customers want to make your acquaintance let them introduce themselves to you. Don’t force your acquaintance onto your customers.
    3. A clean, dry, and set table before I or my guests are expected to sit at it. I shouldn’t be expected to tip if I’m forced to endure the clatter and rudeness of cutlery and chinaware being flung about.
    4. Water and menus on the table within five minutes of sitting down, even in the busiest of restaurants.
    5. Timely attendance - orders taken within five minutes of menus being closed, a simple check that all orders are correct after arriving and all condiment and extra order needs are met without asking, waters refilled at least once mid-meal without asking.
    6. The ability to call my server without having to use Google Earth to find them, or throwing things at them to establish eye contact - I should not be made to feel indebted that they should even deign to acknowledge my presence and having my order should not deny me the right to further attention for the rest of the evening.
    6. A clean and timely bill - it always amazes me when I’m left waiting for the bill. And ditch the happy faces and the “Hi, I’m ….!!!” schtick. I’m not two years old and if the service was bad, it won’t blind me to the fact afterward. This to me is one of the vilest, most insidious, and naff new marketing ploys ever created by the restaurant industry. It’s not cheerfulness when it’s disingenuous, and it’s disingenuous when the whole point is to weed more money when you clearly don’t deserve it if you need to resort to such ploys to get it. I’ve even had bills arrive with the 20% calculation attentively noted even when nothing else was properly attended to, accompanied of course by the obligatory cute happy face drawing over the first available “i”. Just stop it.
    7. If the service is running poor and slow because of short staffing or unforeseen circumstances currently plaguing the restaurant, tell me before I commit to the evening - I’m more likely to come back and try another time if I’m given the option of not having my patience tested when clearly, you know it will be.
    8. If the service is running poor and slow because it’s an hour before show call, don’t expect me to be patient. Any restaurant that depends on theater clientele for their business should plan appropriately to accommodate their customers needs during the rush. At the very least, inform them before you sit them down. And bring the bill well ahead of curtain time, which you should know if that’s the clientele you serve.

    On the other hand, a customer while having rights, must also accept some responsibility.

    If the service is poor, don’t just tip one way or the other, report it. If you leave your tip to do all the talking, you abandon your right and your responsibility to better service to the wishes of the server who has already served you poorly, and the management and/or owners who will never know your complaint. It’s as reasonable to expect the server to self-improve under these conditions as it is to expect them to report their tips to the IRS.

    The chances of poor service surviving longer than necessary on “pity” tips and “self-aggrandizing” tips alone far outweigh the chances of management correcting poor service in their establishment when management remains oblivious to the problems.

    Unfortunately, tipping inevitably makes everyone “happy”. It makes customers happy because most people would sooner pay the “pity” tip never to return, than complain openly in a public place or worse, be thought of even by a total stranger as a “bad tipper”.

    It makes servers happy because all their tips, most of which are either “pity” tips or “absolution” tips, will always reinforce the perception that their service as at least adequate, regardless of the reality of their service.

    Unless their service is truly atrocious, tipping wil allow most servers to get away with sullenness, forgetfulness (ie. not writing down the order), negligence of duty, or worse, condescension.

    Lastly, it makes most management extremely happy because the tipping absolves them from having to deal with the most common complaints which should in fact be one of their biggest concerns. It also makes the odd complaint that does come along seem totally unreasonable because well, nobody complains. Because if they have a complaint, they should just tip accordingly.

    See no evil. Hear no evil. Speak no evil.

    Tipping is the insipid corrosion that has brought about the continual decline in service quality that’s now systemic throughout the West, where quality service is no longer a consumer right but rather a “boon” to bestowed by the servers who deign to provide them.

    What this article and most people who engage in this debate tend to overlook is how a massive industry grew up as an adjunct of anti-tipping sentiment, otherwise known as fast-food and take-out.

25. Steohawk
    October 12th, 2008 at 5:11 pm

    “Using a rational and selfish agent to explain tipping, one reaches the conclusion that the agent should never tip if he does not intend to visit the establishment again.”

    Well, gosh! Perhaps these economists should wake up and realize that their “selfish agent” doesn’t account for compassion, an important motivation for most normal human beings. When you add compassion to the mix, it makes perfect sense that most people want to help the overworked and underpaid waiters and waitresses, even when the service is less than adequate.

26. World Full of Crap
    October 12th, 2008 at 5:45 pm

    I’ve never waited table, so this is a view from the outside looking in.

    My complaint is that since tipping is customarily based on a percentage of the ticket, I should tip the waitress at the waffle house a buck and a half for breakfast, but the waiter at dinner gets $8. Did I get 5 times more or better service from the waiter who brought me a plate and a drink compared to the waitress who brings me a plate and coffee? No.

    Perhaps the question should be do I pay the waitress a 100% tip or the waiter a 3% tip? After all, who am I to decree that the waitress deserves less compensation or has fewer bills to pay than the waiter.

27. NoTippingNoRegrets
    October 12th, 2008 at 7:04 pm

    The other problem with tipping is that so long as it continues to exist as a subsidy in lieu of proper wages and higher standard job qualifications, servers will always remain minimum wage hack jobs, regardless of how good one is over how bad others might be, because it allows everyone and anyone the right to compete for the job, literally anyone.

    Conversely, employers will continue to treat the position as hack jobs for no other reason than that the practice of tipping allows them to do so by absolving them from anything other than “minimum” employer responsibilities because a servers’ wages are subsidized directly by the customer – ie. the customer is the server’s employer, except the customer has no say in the hiring, firing, or setting and adjudicating of the basic job requirements.

    Tipping perpetuates the vicious cycle. It doesn’t cure it. It doesn’t solve it.

    Serving food is not a hack job, nor should it be. It does take skill, enthusiasm, and a modicum of earnestness, and interpersonal skills.

    There should be classes for it like there should be for cleaning staff. We assume wrongly that a) everyone can perform basic household skills and b) everyone can perform them to the same standards of excellence necessary to be a professional, and c) there’s no need to create standards by which we judge those skills, be it to hire people, fire people, or even complain about the service we get from those who perform them.

    Most of us can wield a hammer and a screwdriver but that doesn’t make any of us carpenters or builders. Nor would we hire ourselves to do work even for ourselves to the same expectations that we would hire someone who is presumably skilled at their job.

    Legitimize the job by establishing stricter job requirements and better skilled workers can start demanding better than minimum pay. Create a work environment where better skills, quality service, and professional attitudes can thrive without the threat here-today-gone-tomorrow, off-the-street, and anything goes temp workers and you have the makings of a healthier employer-employee relationship.

    But this won’t happen, because tipping keeps everyone happy in their own little bubbles of denial.

    As for the plea for “compassion”, how much “compassion” do servers and restaurant owners feel for all the social services they’ve deprived by colluding in black market practices, which is basically what tipping really is.

    Where’s your “compassion” when you file your tax returns? Where’s your “compassion” when your service is surly, unkempt, and neglectful? Where’s your “compassion” when you ruin what should have been an enjoyable meal with your lousy service, while leaving no recourse to your customer other than, “Go ahead, I dare you to be a “bad tipper””.

    The better question to ask in this debate isn’t, “Why we tip?” It’s, “Why is tipping “expected”?” Nothing in this world can or should prevent people who really want to tip from tipping, not even the elimination of the expectation to tip. The more pertinent question is why do the people who “want” to tip feel the need to obligate others to do the same. Why, and by what rights, is it “expected”, especially when both sides of the work relationship are clearly scofflaws.

28. NoTippingNoRegrets
    October 12th, 2008 at 7:28 pm

    CORRECTION: The opening statement in my first comment should read,

    “If all the arguments for tipping equals better service are true, then every industry from car dealers to real estate agents to garment workers, and every professional from dentists, doctors, and heart surgeons, to judges, news anchors, and every politician in office and running for office, should all include tipping jars in their billing.”

29. Tempscire
    October 12th, 2008 at 8:31 pm

    If people were really, really concerned about the poor servers making just $2/hour, they’d be demanding some kind of law that servers make at least minimum wage without tips.

    Then, if the server is horrible, there’s no guilt-trip reason not to stiff them on the tip. If they’re fabulous, they can still be tipped handsomely, as a tip ought to be something extra earned on top of the expected minimum.

    Oh, and this? Diners generally tip the same percentage no matter the quality of the service and no matter the setting. Totally not surprising (and negates the argument that tips will steer the quality of service).

30. sparge
    October 12th, 2008 at 11:20 pm

    Tipping is silly. Charge a service fee or build it into the price of your food.

    BUT, since it is stupidly the norm and doesn’t look to be eliminated anytime soon, I tip, because the waitstaff is counting on that money as wages, and I don’t want to be ignored or worse if I return to a restaurant.

31. Video Game Dork
    October 13th, 2008 at 1:59 am

    @ NoTippingNoRegrets : tl;dr mean anything?! Dude, that WAY too much for a single comment on a post (each time). Just thought I’d call that to your attention.

    Kevin’s method - I’m sorry, but that’s one of the dick-iest and dbag-iest thing to do ever. The last thing a person wants to have rubbed in their face is the ice-thin superiority role that customers have over employees, especially at low-paying jobs.

32. Jayce
    October 13th, 2008 at 2:48 am

    Rob, you have it wrong. Tips is not an acronym. http://www.snopes.com/language/acronyms/tip.asp

33. firithlotiel
    October 13th, 2008 at 8:30 am

    And theres the fact that waitresses live off of their tips and can get paid only $2.18/hour if the establishment sees fit…

34. ted
    October 13th, 2008 at 9:07 am

    Yeah, NoTippingNoRegrets, really. Talk much at home?

    I doubt anybody read your highly cogent and persuasive arguments either for or against tipping. I assume it’s against, because of the name you used.

    Next time, pelase just provide us with the abridged version of your dissertation.

35. Goober
    October 13th, 2008 at 10:46 am

    The way to get excellent service is to put a stack of $1 bills on the table when you sit down. Make it enough to be about 50% of what you expect to spend. Tell the waitress, “Every time we get less then stellar service, we’ll take at least one of these away. Whatever is left at the end of the meal is your tip.”

    If you end up tipping 50%, it’ll be worth it.

36. rokstar
    October 13th, 2008 at 9:17 pm

    Been in Australia for the past two years where tipping is virtually non-existent. As an American, I gotta say the service sux (sorry Aussies). Draw your own conclusions.

37. just a guy
    October 13th, 2008 at 11:11 pm

    Goober, that’s Kevin’s method with a (presumably) higher staring percentage. Like others said, very dick-y.

38. Ali S.
    October 15th, 2008 at 7:43 pm

    I tip because I know the folks who work in the food services like waiters/waitresses survive off of tips. This includes delivery people. Besides if I’m happy with the service I got I leave a tip to show that I enjoyed myself.

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