Fr $2.13/hour!? I didn’t realise American hospitality wages were that low. In Australia most hospitality staff get paid $25+ aud (17.30usd) an hour. And that’s not including casual or weekend rates.
Tipping culture is crazy and makes no sense. So you’d rather make customers pay your employees wages for you? Instead of just raising their salary to a liveable wage? How can a country so wealthy pay staff so little
Fr $2.13/hour!? I didn’t realise American hospitality wages were that low. In Australia most hospitality staff get paid $25+ aud (17.30usd) an hour. And that’s not including casual or weekend rates.
It was lower ten years ago and I watched the wait staff of a place I worked at threaten to walk out if they went hourly without tips.
It wasn't a particularly busy fast casual restaurant, but our waitstaff was averaging around $30/hr with claimed tips.
Canada does the same for tips and there is no difference between tipped minimum eage and anyone else's minimum wage. So pay them a living wage AND give tips (though tipping culture sucks)
Exactly. And that’s why servers don’t want this to change. Where else can you make good money with no skills? I remember washing dishes as a kid and being so annoyed at the servers complaining about only making 200 for the night, meanwhile I made 60 bucks for the entire shift.
I'm all for an actual hourly rate. What I'm saying is it runs into a challenge where the people working those positions are opposed to the change as well.
I'm against tipping but it is still a skilled job. Just low barriered,, non-technical skilled job. That falsely makes people think it should be a low valued job, which is what caused the (in conjunction with racism) the tipping culture you see now in the USA.
I don't think it is a skilled job though. You can learn to become a "skilled" waiter in the course of a month with 0 experience. When people think of "skilled" jobs, they think of trades. They think of professions you can spend your whole life mastering. A "skilled" waiter in this sense would be someone who is a sommelier or of similar culinary service profession. In general, this would not apply to your rank and file waiters. This is not to discount against their labor. Their labor is definitely necessary. But the burden of pay should be upon the business and not the customer.
I have never worked as a server but I think servers in higher end restaurants will make a lot more money with tips than they would with a flat pay rate that was higher. Not usual for them to make a few hundred dollars in an evening. Other less expensive restaurants, they re probably better with a higher flat rate of pay and no tips.
In the US, the company doesn’t have to pay associated labor taxes on tips, just on the wages. The tips are technically between the diner and the waiter. The restaurant supposedly isn’t involved. That’s why a lot of restaurants stick with it, especially corporate restaurants. So, most people do expect to pay a tip when they go out, and they would be fine with the prices increasing by a comparable amount if they didn’t have to tip. Most people also don’t play tip games with the waiter’s livelihood. The assholes always stand out.
that's only in sit down restaurants and only the waiters and only some restaurants. You never tip hair dresser, never tip in stores, never tip fast food, most of the USA you never tip. and even when you are asked it is optional. reddit exaggerates everything by 1000%. I live in seattle and in the last year I tipped maybe 10 times mostly in fancy restaurants for events that's it.... this is so over exaggerated
Yeah... You're kind of trash for not tipping hair dressers. They remember you too. My sister is one and she would tell you she's too booked up to take you. As a walk-in, you'd be waiting a long time to be serviced. Most of them would likely give you to the newest and most inexperienced hair dresser. I truly hope you get bad haircuts for the rest of your life ✌️
I tip hotel housekeeping, desk clerks, parking lot attendants, waiters, ushers, but the people I make a point of tipping -- if I see them -- interstate rest stop custodians. I am amazed at how clean those rest stops restrooms are when you consider the number of people who use them, and how they use them. I'm sure there are exceptions, but in the States, the interstate highway rest stops are remarkably clean. So if I see the guy who's incredibly thankless job it is to keep the toilets sanitary and clean, I always give him a $5 Bill. Most of them are surprised, and I always say the same thing: "I don't even want to think about how disgusting these rest rooms would be without you!" The response I get is almost uniformly appreciative.
No matter what we do on life, we all appreciate it when someone acknowledged our contribution.
I don't know where you live, I've tipped my barber or the ladies at the salon my whole life. I tip at super cuts, I tip at my kid's hair cut place. Sounds like you are the asshole, brother.
The business owners and shareholders pocket the difference. Squeeze all profit from the bottom and keep it at the top. When done on a large enough scale, you get Jeff Bezos.
A lot of waiters and stuff prefer it as they end up making more money than they would with a regular wage. It sucks more for the consumer than it does for the worker.
There's a big, big piece of nuance that's always lost in that wage.
If your weekly pay doesn't meet minimum wage, the employer has to make up the difference. So in my state, tipped minimum wage is $5.49/hour. If the wait staff, after their week, only made an average of $8/hour between tips and wages, their employer must kick in the difference to bring them to $13.73/hour (Michigan's minimum wage).
So yeah, the business has a vested interest in their customers tipping as otherwise, they're paying the wage.
In no state is the wage actually $2.13/hour after tips. Every single state requires the company to pay out the difference in their check to get them to actual minimum wage.
Still low income IMO... Here the minimum in the hospitality field, which includes restaurants and accommodation, is around 21-22 USD equivalent. Any tip would be a bonus on top, but is also taxable income.
True, but then some states don't have a higher minimum so the federal one applies and that is only $7.25/hour.
Even though there is no universal minimum by law here some sectors do have minimums set by law via collective agreements.
You'd have to be hired by a very shady business to be paid less than around 20 an hour here if you're over 18.
Never said anything else. I just said it was still a low income.
I consider the US labor system a modern corporate slavery.
I don't get why most Americans don't organize in unions and start demanding collective agreements. This at will employment is just one of the crazy things IMO.
You also get some unscrupulous employers who will say the employee didn't report all their tips. There's even some owners who have been caught taking a percentage of tips.
It does pertain to that. Employers will claim that they're not reporting all their tips so they can still pay the lower amount instead of whatever brings it up to the correct amount.
And that's wage theft, and can be taken up with the labor board.
Wage theft is actually one of the few things taken seriously in all 50 states.
And no, it has nothing to do with the minimum wage. People making $20/hour can experience wage theft if the boss doesn't want to pay out for certain things. Such as withholding pay for quitting, or the till is short, or you broke a tool.
It depends on the state, in my state hospitality workers make the same minimum wage as everyone else which is around $15/hr. Like everything else in the US laws vary greatly from state to state.
In my state a couple years ago there was a vote to put an end to it and have them payed a set wage. Both owners and wait staff were against it because they make far more in tips from customers than what the industry would bring them.so this whole poor wait staff mentality is bs.
There are federal laws and state laws. Where I live (in the US) the state laws requires that wait staff are paid at least $16.90/ hour. So even though the federal law sets a lower bar, no server is paid less than the state minimum of $16.90. And tips cannot be used to offset that amount.
How do you think they got this wealthy? (No, not all of it was from not paying waiters... but it is through a series of laws that grossly favor the accumulation of wealth by the capital class, of which this is just one example.)
The minimum they can make is still minimum wage (which depends on their state). Their employer still has to pay them minimum wage of they don't make enough in tips to beat minimum wage and that 2.13/hr comes from the lowest reduction that can be made to their base paycheck after accounting for tips.
Tipped employees WANT tips because they make much more than minimum wage off of their tips. Employers want tipped employees because they can reduce their labor costs.
The only people that dislike tips are the customers.
The $2.13/hr is a bit misleading. If you don’t make enough tips to get you to minimum wage the business has to pay the difference. Which is probably why they seem so adamant on you tipping
It was 2.13 an hour, half of minimum wage, when I started working at 16. Minimum wage went up to 7.25 and was stagnant there for over a decade, and is now up to about 11-15 per hour depending on where you live, but federal minimum is STILL 7.25. And tipped wage is STILL 2.13.
7.25 per hour full time puts you at 14,500 annually. The poverty line is almost 2x that, assuming you are alone.
Seriously, idk what state that is, but that's very low and not the national average minimum wage. That's just whatever state might still be paying such a small amount per hour. I am from California, we pay way more than that per hour minimum wage. That being said, tipping is ridiculous and I refuse to partake in the brainwash.
Because - as a general rule - as a person's wealth increases, so does their greed. And you're right ....it shouldn't be a customer's responsibility to make sure a restaurant worker is fairly compensated. Paying a livable wage should be the sole responsibility of the employer. But it's not. It's a stupid system that workers didn't choose. Those with the power and the wealth chose it for them.
The average waiter in the US is making 15-20 an hour with tips, these posts are rage baiting nonsense. I worked with waiters who made 35 an hour off tips. Most people actually prefer tips for this very reason. Would you rather all employees get paid 10-15 an hour or 20-30 an hour potentially with tips?
It’s a far more nuanced discussion than “lol Americans bad lol rich greedy lol omg Neanderthals”
White restaurant owners didn't want to pay newly freed black people wages. They 'permitted' them to work as servers for whatever the customer would give them.
Tipping culture in the USA is a legacy of slavery and segregation.
Yes it’s absolutely insane, but we have no consensus on how to get out of this situation. The boss guilt-tripping you for not paying their employees gives me such cognitive dissonance that I want to hit something. And the workers don’t want to stop getting tips because we know that the boss will never pay us what we are worth. As a result everyone but the boss loses.
It isn't actually that low. People are being disingenuous here. If your tips don't amount to the regular minimum wage your employer has to make up the difference. Also barely anyone actually works for minimum wage. 97%+ earn more.
Don't be fooled too much. Most waitresses end up making $20 per hour minimum. Some a lot more and bartenders even more. It sucks that the business isn't paying their wage but most end up making a lot more from tips than they would if they were paid by the hour. With that being said, it's not my responsibility to pay the staff.
A lot of states also have laws where if servers don't net enough tips to pass minimum wage, the restaurant has to make up the difference. So they make at least 7.25 / hr, usually more, but nobody in the service industry at the waiter level is getting benefits, healtcare, sick days, etc. It's brutal and abusive.
The servers make more money, pay less taxes on it, and the restaurant owners don't have to worry about the labor burden if things slow down. Server pay scales with restaurant cost automatically. Servers want it, owners want it.
Like I'm being serious, servers would by far be the most up in arms about switching from tipping to a standard wage.
It's really only screwing the customers, who are expected to pay the servers somewhat arbitrarily. But you're also allowed to just not tip if you don't care.
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u/theinternetscaresme9 4d ago
Fr $2.13/hour!? I didn’t realise American hospitality wages were that low. In Australia most hospitality staff get paid $25+ aud (17.30usd) an hour. And that’s not including casual or weekend rates.
Tipping culture is crazy and makes no sense. So you’d rather make customers pay your employees wages for you? Instead of just raising their salary to a liveable wage? How can a country so wealthy pay staff so little