Poll: Would you stop tipping if they made minimum wage?

[GiantRaven]

Fuck tipping. Nobody tips me and I'll be either taking your order, making your food, or giving it out to you. Oh wait, I work in fast food - a crappy job not considered tip worthy whilst other crappy jobs are.

Fuck it.

 

[Apollo45]

It's a cultural thing I suppose, but I would continue to tip. Contrary to what many people seem to think, it's not just carrying my food from one place to another. That's a big part of it, but they have to do so in a timely manner, they have to remember what I ordered (whether they write it down or not is up to them), they have to be personable and they often have to clean up after me. More than that, they have to be on call should I need anything, be prepared to deal with my bad attitude should I have one (I don't usually, but there are definitely people out there that do), and anything else that may come up. And if their shift is up while I'm still eating they have to stay longer and wait for me to get done, even if that takes me an extra hour.

So, in light of that, I would still tip them. I might tip them less, but I tend to tip fairly well in any case so it would likely end up fairly normalized. If they did poorly I'd tip them just as poorly as I do now. Have some stories from there I could tell you...

 

[thePyro_13]

I don't tip, I already live in a country where employees are paid by their employer.

 

[Anthony Wells]

I generally tip on how well the server acts..if they are nice i will tip..if they are not i wont. So yeah i would still tip no matter how much they get payed...

on a side note i wonder how long until godwin's law is invoked

 

[devilofthemist]

well in England (at least where i live) giving tips isn't really a big thing, I've heard in america that if you don't tip they get really pissy or something,

 

[Elate]

I don't tip.

That's because I'm in the UK though, and there is minimum wage... so.. yeah. I think it's stupid for people to tip over here, unless I personally, really really liked the service I don't bother.

 

[surg3n]

Why do we tip though? - I don't think it's because we feel that the staff aren't paid enough - for all we know they earn decent money from tips. I tip because I like people who prepare and serve food for me, to know I appreciate them, and there is absolutely no reason to spit in my food, or do anything else to it.

I always tip delivery drivers, when ordering pizza or something as well - those guys earn far less than waiters, and those guys need the money - usually someone takes on that job because they have no money, often it's on top of a full time job, a couple of bucks to delivery drivers is good karma I reckon. The managing director of the company I work for, has a son who often delivers chinese food to my house - how awkward is that... getting food delivered by, and tipping someone who'll most likely end up as my boss some day.

I tend to tip taxi drivers as well, but mostly because I'm more interested in getting out the car and away from them that I don't want to wait on change. Once the taxi I was in hit a dog, that was a tricky one - I had to walk the remaining 100 yards home, but the taxi driver was friendly so I felt obliged to tip them - but at the same time I didn't want it to appear that I was tipping because I approved of the carnage.

I often tip bar staff, there's no harm at all in being friendly with bar staff, especially if it lets you skip ahead and be served first... it's the one douchebag move that women can't complain about .

 

[Arakasi]

I love living in a country where tipping isn't a custom.

 

[Insanity72]

Nope I'm in Australia and as far as I know, we don't tip at all, At least not in QLD

 

[Doogan]

Yes I will always tip a good Waiter/Waitress and I will always tell them to put the tip straight into their own pocket. I am tipping them for their excellent service and not the resturant.

 

[jklinders]

This is sort of a multi tiered question.

I'm going to start with what should seem to be the most obvious part. Minimum wage. The food service sector is trying to set up a similar tiered wage system here in Canada. I disapprove strongly of this. Minimum wage should be just that. Minimum. There should not be caveats or addendums on it. If you do not want to meet a minimum standard of wage for your employees then you can bloody well do the work yourself. I don't want to hear any BS about how it's too expensive, wages are a cost of doing business, a low cost relatively speaking(food typically costs about 10-13% more than total wages) and if you can't afford them then your business is going under anyway.

As for tipping...I'm neutral. On the one hand, I feel that it is a way to allow an employer to get away with paying peanuts to wait staff by having guests supplement the wages voluntarily. On the other hand I know that wait staff are often in a tight crack. They catch it from both sides. The cooks and the guests. On a bad day their job can be colossally miserable. But as a cook I do sometimes resent the fact they get far more compensated than I do when they have a good day. There is no way on God's verdant green Earth that employers would pay as much as a server gets on a good day in tips. But it is not certain income. Frankly if I was an employer I would not want to deal with the nonsense of working out tiered wages. That's time out of my day I would rather spend doing more productive things. Many restaurants also supplement the wages of the cooks through "tipout" from the servers. This is a partial way to even the scale out.

As someone who has cooked for 13 years and managed for several of those years I would only support a removal of the "tipping culture" if there was a way to ensure that the 15-20% raise in the price of a plate went straight to wages. That cannot be guaranteed so until it can be the only defense these low wage earners have from being truly exploited by unscrupulous employers is to keep the tips coming.

 

[Bvenged]

In the UK waiters do make minimum wage (~£6.50 for 21yo, so $8 maybe) and we still tip them SOMETIMES depending on their service.

Abroad and I will tip every waiter, no matter their pay, because I ordered £20 meal so I will give them an extra £2 for their service.

If the food-place is good they will combine the tips into a pot and share it out between all the staff equally, so the chefs gets some too. At least that's what a lot of places in the UK do.

 

[jklinders]

In Canada Alberta, I'm pretty sure they do make minimum wage. And we all still tip. So I guess my answer is "yes."

It isn't that way here in Ontario they still get paid less than minimum here. I think we should follow suit with you guys

Crap I forgot that they do that crap in Ontario. Yeah the food service sector there can pound sand for being a pack of greedy exploitative assholes. The industry wants it out here in the Maritimes too. So far they have been rebuffed. I hope it stays that way.

 

[Latinidiot]

I don't understand tipping, it really bugs me.

I mean, i understand that waiters want and need their tip to get some food on their own table every day, but I don't understand why the system works like that! I mean, a cashier doesn't need to beg for money from the clients by smilig like a BLOODY maniac all the time, and neither do most othe jobs.

 

[Grouchy Imp_v1legacy]

Every job in the UK must comply to the national minimum wage, so I feel no need to tip. I do tip if the service I receive particularly deserves it, but I'll be damned if I'll tip half-arsed service just because it's expected.

 

[Michael Logan]

In sweden the tip is already included in the price, so no need to tip here!

 

[Ilikemilkshake]

What is the point of minimal wage if jobs aren't required to meet that minimum?

Uh, well i only tip if i feel like they did a particularly good job, so i'd continue to do that i guess.

 

[MelasZepheos_v1legacy]

No. Minimum wage is often not enough to live on, and especially in Britain if you made only minimum wage you'd be in poverty. The only two options are more than one job or tipping.

I'd tip, I don't want to be an asshole. I tip almost everyone who offers a customer service based job. Taxi drivers, bartenders, cashiers. I don't tip shelf stackers though because I remember from my shelf stacking days that there are a lot of very strict rules about what you are and aren't allowed to accept as gifts from customers, so I don't want to get them in trouble.

 

[jklinders]

In sweden the tip is already included in the price, so no need to tip here!

I do not approve. Enforced tipping is the same as saying "you will enjoy your meal and service" before you are even seated. It should be performance based. Good wait staff get more tips. Good workers in other fields get higher wages. In Sweden the good and the bad get paid the same? No thanks.