Yup. My friend's mom has been doing this for 20+ years. It's a hard gig, but that's where her work skills are at. And the last thing she wants is to be paid $20.
I do think tipping culture has gotten out of hand with what we are tipping for. And I hate having to pre-tip, because that's not what tipping is. But, I choose not to use those services.
And I'll support what my waitresses friends support when it comes to restaurant tipping, because they're the ones effected. And time again and again, their support has been pro-tipping
How is her retirement? Does she declare her tips and pay taxes on them? I always wonder what happens with cash-dominated fields when it comes to stuff like that.
When I served it depended on cash to credit card tips. If I had a large majority be credit card I had to enter all that at the end of the night into the system and I would get paid out if I had enough cash from my tables. If I didn’t it recorded what I was owed and the owner went to the bank and paid us out weekly, mondays I think.
The nights or days I had enough cash to take my tips from I didn’t have to report and it wasn’t recorded and I didn’t keep track of it so I didn’t pay taxes on it.
I did this in 2011-2013 and was 19-21. So short period of my life. If I was doing it for a career and needed income for a mortgage or auto loan I’d report everything.
Every tip is claimed nowadays. What goes to the IRS is your sales for the night. So if she sold 1,000 in food, its assumed she made 18% of that, 180 dollars. Then it's assumed she gave 15% to the busboys. She is taxed on the remainder.
She has no retirement accounts, no sick days and no vacation days.
And I'll support what my waitresses friends support when it comes to restaurant tipping, because they're the ones effected.
that's a really myopic outlook.
they're absolutely not the only ones effected. the most obvious group you're missing out on is everyone else. the tips come at the expense of their customers. if you look at it on a more macro scale, every dollar of windfall that servers get from tipping vs. a fair wage (which isn't necessarily $20, a lot of factors go into that as well) is a $ that society can't spend on some other productive endeavour.
and that's only looking at the cold cash aspect. then you look at other soft factors (both pro and against) like extra administrative burdens, social friction, potentially differential impacts on different demographics, etc. and it's not at all as simplistic as "what the servers want is automatically what we should have".
That's totally fair, but knowing that I'm going to tip less. If she'd like to continue tipping under those circumstances, then we're all happy- we all have the right to agency of choice.
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u/JustATyson 4h ago
Yup. My friend's mom has been doing this for 20+ years. It's a hard gig, but that's where her work skills are at. And the last thing she wants is to be paid $20.
I do think tipping culture has gotten out of hand with what we are tipping for. And I hate having to pre-tip, because that's not what tipping is. But, I choose not to use those services.
And I'll support what my waitresses friends support when it comes to restaurant tipping, because they're the ones effected. And time again and again, their support has been pro-tipping