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I’M NOT A GENEROUS guy. Which brings me to tipping.
I see a price on the menu, and I’m willing to spend that amount on the food. Then I have to spend additional money, after having consumed that food, because someone served it to me. Why?
What about the kitchen staff who cooked my meal? Should I tip them also? After all, I can’t cook, so the kitchen staff is doing me a more important service than the person who carries my food to the table. I could go to the kitchen and get the food myself. I just can’t cook it.
Why should someone serving at an inexpensive diner get less than a waiter or waitress at a high-end restaurant? The diner waitstaff are working just as hard as those at high-end restaurants. And what about the folks working behind the counter at McDonald’s? They also get me food and I don’t tip. Why not?
How much should I tip? Should it be a percentage of the bill or a certain dollar amount? At the bottom of restaurant checks, they often suggest tip amounts based on various percentages. That gives me a fighting chance of being either generous or foolish. If I go with the highest suggested percentage, I can feel generous. Unless the service was terrible, in which case I feel foolish.
Should I tip anyone who does anything for me? That’s a lot of people. Does a carpenter get tipped? He did something for me. I’m confused.
Giving money to a charity makes more sense to me than tipping. I can write off charitable donations on my taxes, assuming I itemize. I can’t do that when I tip.
I’ve never worked a job in my life where tipping was considered a standard method of compensation. My paycheck was all I ever got. Bonuses were few and far between. For that reason, I don’t see tipping as necessary.
To overcome my prejudice on this subject, I leave the tipping to my wife. She worked as a waitress in her early years, so she better appreciates what the waitstaff do. If she wants to leave a lousy tip, it’s deserved because—unlike her husband—she isn’t naturally cheap.
I never look at what my wife tips because I’d inevitably ask, “Why so much?” I could always find a reason something was wrong, whether it was the fault of the waitstaff or the kitchen staff.
Delegating this task to my wife is a win-win. My wife feels in control of our dining costs, and the waitstaff gets a better deal than they’d get from me. Everyone is happy.
I have evolved over the years on tips. I used to do 15% plus $1.00. And I would do the math. Now I’m up to 20% plus. We often go to inexpensive places where the difference between an average tip and a good tip is $1.00. That dollar means nothing to me, but if everyone did that, the workers would get a lot more. Still, I admit for the higher bills it is harder to want to tip “appropriately.” I’m like Mr. Gartland in that I get my mind set on the menu price.
As mytimetotravel asks, I wonder why the standard percentage has risen from 15% to 20%. It should remain the same as the prices go up.
As for the comments about our offsetting the employer wage costs, I assume if they paid the servers more, the price of the food would go up, so it all comes out in the wash.
Obviously, you never worked at a restaurant.
My sister’s post-covid acknowledgement to wait-staff other service-sector wage earners is “thank you for working.” My way of saying this is to overtip them, regardless of the quality of service, food or whatever.
Given how much I count my blessings to have had a satisfying career making a decent salary and funding a comfortable retirement, it’s the least I can do.
The amount of the tip is essentially meaningless to me at this stage of life, but means a lot to the recipient.
The issue is very simple, we are subsidizing the owners of the restaurant . They pay the servers the min they have to pay depending on the state. Some states require at least min wage, most require much less, usually in the 2 dollars range . Per IRS rules (tip credit rule) if the server’s tips don’t bring them ups to min wage the employer must cover the difference . Most servers make well over the min wage. Cooks, bus people and mgrs make at min wage or higher. Some cooks can make 20 dollars an hour or more.
By fed law an employer cannot force servers to share tips. They can voluntarily . The IRS has ruled time and time again that tips are “gifts” to the servers, not wages from the employe