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Personally I have no problem with tipping servers and others for that matter. I just tipped two delivery men $20 each when they delivered a piece of furniture. I tip at Starbucks and usually when I see a tip jar on the counter. My point of view is these workers need the money more than I do and I can afford it. Maybe I’m helping a kid through college or just with family bills. They are working after all and I remember what it was like trying to earn money as a kid.
Here is another point of view posted on social media media.
“This whole you’re obligated to tip when you go out to eat thing is wild to me because you still deserve to be able to go out and have a nice meal even if you are not able to tip.”
The “deserve” part caught my eye. I never thought of eating out as being deserved, especially if you are not able tip – eat less so you can tip fairly.
When I go out to eat with friends, there is always haggling over the tip. If they give me the bill I add 20% and divide by the number paying – simple, done deal. Not anymore. 20% is too much, make it 18% even 15%. I’m so embarrassed I usually slip an extra few bucks to the server as we leave.
Then there is the good service argument. Rarely will poor service, controllable by the server, cause me to lower my tip. In fact, I can’t recall such incident. I’m guessing most of what we don’t like, even a delay in eating – certainly the quality of food – is not controlled by the server.
Think back to your own job. Are there bad days, screwup days, non-productive days? Do you get paid less on those days? Generally no, certainly not if you are salaried.
Many people feel it is the restaurant’s responsibility to pay servers and a “living wage” no less. Where I live that’s $23.00 an hour for a single person. Add one child and it is $39.80 = $82,784 per year. For tipped employees, New Jersey allows a lower minimum wage of $5.26 per hour, provided that the total hourly earnings—including tips—meet or exceed the standard NJ minimum wage of $15.13 per hour
Most states provide for servers in a similar way. In California servers must be paid the state minimum wage of $16.00 without credit for tips.
The federal law is similar; the base minimum is $2.13, but if tips don’t bring pay up to the regular minimum of $7.25, the employer must make up the difference. In effect, servers have the same federal and in most cases state minimum wage as all workers.
A 2024 study found when it comes to sit-down restaurants, 71% of women and only 63% of men always tip. 35% of Gen Zers always tip when dining in, compared to 56% of millennials, 78% of Gen Xers and 86% of baby boomers. I found these percentages shocking.
I’m older than baby boomers, I always tip. Are those differences telling us something – perhaps about respect for others?
The simple solution would appear to be no tipping and increase prices and/or add a service charge. In Europe many restaurants will add a service charge to the bill to cover table service. Tipping is usually 5% to 10%, if done.
There would have to be hefty menu price increases to account for variations in meals served while servers are still being paid by the hour. A fixed cost versus highly variable revenue from food consumption is quite different from other types of businesses. Full service restaurants have a profit margin of 2-6%. Apple has a profit margin of about 25%
I see an analogy with health care. Bury the cost in taxes and premiums so I can view it as “free.” So what if my burger is now $15.00? I’d rather tip.
I have my own tip. Be friendly, fair and generous with anyone providing you with a personal service – even if they are just doing their job.
“A 2024 study found when it comes to sit-down restaurants, 71% of women and only 63% of men always tip. 35% of Gen Zers always tip when dining in, compared to 56% of millennials, 78% of Gen Xers and 86% of baby boomers. I found these percentages shocking.”
I find it disgusting – I can’t imagine people sitting down in a full service restaurant in the US and intentionally leaving without tipping anything.
I’m sure most here will disagree, but I call these people low lifes – and bet few ever had to work for a living serving the public.
It’s actually sad, because I’m older and tip 20-25% as long as the service is fairly decent, but seeing the above survey results, I now have to assume the average server isn’t very intelligent.
Because I often see them lavish more attention on the younger guests as a rule. They wrongly assume older people don’t tip well.
Perhaps the problem with the survey is the definition of “sit-down restaurant”? When respondents hear that phrase, do they think of the local fine-dining restaurant — or McDonald’s? I’m very suspicious of these surveys, in large part because they aren’t designed to gather useful insights, but to generate publicity for the firm paying for the survey. The sample size is often small and the survey poorly designed.
RQ
I agree with your tipping advice……..I tip any and all workers that come to our house from job to do…..$20 each and tell them I’m buying lunch today….that little bit gets a job well done and makes us both happy me for giving and them a little extra…..dinning out we tip extra cash to both wait staff and to bartender we are always remembered and the little cash makes them smile……we are lucky to be where we are in our life so we give back when it is not expected just giving us and them a little joy
TIP, To Insure Promptness. Somehow I learned it was important to tip at restaurants, as my parents taught me that was a Big part of their pay. Over the years, I tipped around 10%, then 15% and now much more. The Pandemic got me to tip higher, as they actually risked getting sick. So even for Curbside pickup I tipped 15%. Now I tip more at the actual restaurant in the 20% plus range, and more recently I tip higher, as I hear all the needs of people waiting tables, and I generally now tip 30% to 50%. My grandson taught me after working at a restaurant, how tips are split among, the server, bartender, the clean up person, the cook and others. So that money does not just go to the server, and all these folks are very much are in need, for their livelihood, saving for school, and so many things. If you can, become a better tipper. It does feel good to offer tips for good service, like people who show extra care delivering your furniture and the like. Just do it!
Pretty sure that’s a backronym as well as non-sensical English. Ensure/=Insure.
There is an interesting book on the history of tipping in the US.
Tipping: An American Social History of Gratuities by Kerry Seagrave.
https://books.google.com/books?id=PJfTYcB48uIC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false
Very timely post. I was out for breakfast with my ROMEO group of friends yesterday. We sat at a table in a diner for almost 90 minutes. The waiters (we had more than 1 serving our table) kept coming over refilling our coffees waters etc while we occupied the table. When the bill came they handed it to me (the retired accountant) to figure out the per person cost. I added 20% to the check amount, divided by 6 and came up with an amount around $18 and change. I just took out a $20 and told the guys $20 each so there was no hassles with change etc. Yes, it was a bit more than 20% but it was an easy and appreciated gesture that cost us what… $1.50 more as a tip. Easy peasy and we all felt fine with it!
That’s the right thing to do in my opinion, especially occupying the table for an hour and a half.
I always tip, and once in a while if I’ve had a really good connection with a server I like to see if I can impact their lives. I’ll lay a 50 or a 100 on them just to watch the reaction.
Suggest reading this and considering your motivations for such behavior.
That article says the following: notoriously underpaid waiters who otherwise usually don’t even make minimum wage.”
That is not true. They always earn the minimum wage and in many states a lot more than federal minimum. New York being one of them.
In most states they earn a separate, “tipped minimum wage”, set federally at $2.13/hour. The employer is supposed to make up the difference between the tipped and regular minimum wage if an employees’ tips don’t cover the difference. Whether that always happens is open to question. In other words, a server has to earn, in tips, at least the difference between the tipped minimum wage and the normal minimum wage before tips increase their income above normal minimum wage. This is true for New York, although the tipped minimum wage is higher than the federal minimum.
As with some other things in American life, such as the tax code and health care, this adds considerable complexity not found elsewhere.
Sorry, but I completely reject the ideas in that article as having any relevance whatsoever to why I occasionally tip big.
I do it because I remember generous gestures strangers have made to me, and I believe in paying them forward.
And I do it because nobody grows up hoping for a career waiting tables — like working a grocery checkout line or driving a cab, they do it out of necessity — and because within that necessity a hundred bucks can mean a great, great deal in the moment.
And I completely reject your characterization of my actions with the pejorative “such behavior.”
The grand gesture may make you feel good in the moment, but it does nothing to fix the server’s ongoing need for tips. It also emphasizes the difference in your status. And what about the other servers in the restaurant? What does it say to single out one? I once worked, briefly, as a barmaid in England, and that kind of gesture would have made me extremely uncomfortable. (Tips in an English pub, in so far as they exist at all, consist of an occasional offer to buy a drink.)
I can totally see that Mike’s actions would be pure as to their intentions and well received by the recipient. Yet in a ordinary type of restaurant a $100 tip could cause friction among staff unless they actually truly pool tips. After all the non recipients may be working just as hard or harder. That’s the problem with an imperfect system.
When I worked as a waiter during a student summer I remember all sorts of politics over who got the most lucrative evening shifts and even the hosts having favourites for table allocation. The worst was waiting on big coach tour groups on a set menu and standardised share of a low service charge. You worked your ass off, got no personal engagement and a tip take worse than your worst regular night. A proper tip pool would have made such nights a fair and more enjoyable experience.
Like many here I tip 20% at restaurants, sometimes more. But what I don’t quite understand is the obsession with tipping cash. I heard the argument that the restaurant might not forward tips to the servers. If that’s the case why are you eating at a restaurant that you think is dishonest? Many restaurants pool tips and then evenly distribute them amongst servers and perhaps a percentage to dishwashers and cooks. I fear that by paying cash tips you encourage servers to perhaps pocket the money instead of contributing it to the pool.
I think the way people want to know others tipping habits is more interesting than the tipping itself. It really ought not be interesting at all, but here we are.
I agree.
I seem to remember reading that the unique American tipping culture is one of those unfortunate legacies of slavery. The jobs exempted from minimum wage laws were those most likely to be performed by African Americans. I wish I could see a way to do away with it while paying everyone at least a living wage. I didn’t grow up in a tipping culture and figuring who to tip what is a pain. I love visiting countries where no or minimal tips are expected. The service is still fine.
Happily my retirement community doesn’t allow tipping, although we have a big campaign at this time of year to fund bonus checks for all employees.
The pervasive tipping culture in the U.S. leads to decision fatigue: it’s tiring to have to decide seemingly at every turn whether or how much to tip. My CCRC also disallows tipping. We have two campaigns (summer vacation, winter holiday) to fund bonus checks for all employees. I like needing to make only two decisions a year.
mytimetotravel, I wish I could see the article/study you are referring to.
If you do an internet search on “exceptions minimum wage legacy slavery” you will get a lot of hits. You might start here.
Then you might look at the situation in other countries which don’t have a recent history of slavery. The UK, for instance, where feudalism (arguably a form of slavery) died out after the Black Death in the 1300s. Or France. Or Germany.
I am sharing the opinion piece parkslope references.
Another issue that bears scrutiny is prison labor.
This is entirely imaginary. Tips started in medieval England before the existence of the US. The word made it’s way into common use by 1600 meaning you can assume the custom started by 1500 the latest.
The research paper linked makes obvious errors like that ex-slave labor was in any way a large part of the unionizing forces (they were mainly farm labor outside of the process) centering a fringe is characteristic of bad scholarship.
Be very wary of modern scholarship, esp anything from the social sciences, it’s not an evidence based effort.
Yes, tipping started in England, but the UK does not have the two-tier minimum wage system that exists in the US. Wait staff are paid the same minimum as anyone else, which is why tipping at 20% is a peculiarly American phenomenon. Please point me to a European country that has a two-tier minimum wage.
It also seems that farmworkers weren’t covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act until 1966.
Tipping Is a Legacy of Slavery
Abolish the racist, sexist subminimum wage now.
NY Times
Feb 5, 2021
Seems like contributing to bonuses and tipping ends up the same thing, but I suspect the bonus has a better favorable impact.
As I mentioned, living wage is a tricky thing. In my example, I bet the living wage number is higher than many owners net from their business.
I think that’s a pretty poor argument against a living wage. If an owner is really doing that badly they should shutter the business and go work for someone else.
Equally I don’t see why a living wage should vary by the personal circumstances of the employee, it being a personal choice to have kids etc. So the exaggeration of what a living wage needs to be as part of a overall dismissal of the concept is also flawed.
Seems to me there is an argument that arguing tips are a better system than a living wage is in part saying that one would prefer to preserve an indentured serving class. As the owner of a business I referenced elsewhere identified there were all sorts of business performance benefits from stopping the continual distracting economic ups and downs of tips.
I remember listening to Freakonomics podcast featuring a restaurant owner who banned tipping and instead decided to pay his staff a fair wage.
The main problem was not the staff who were perfectly happy and in fact more inclined to stick around IIRC but customers who still wanted to tip because they derived some sort of generosity endorphin hit from it.
Edit: Not found that episode but here’s a transcript for another that covers studies that a tipping culture can be both racist and sexist and the correlation between tipping and corruption
https://freakonomics.com/podcast/should-tipping-be-banned-rebroadcast/
And here’s the bit from the horse’s mouth about angry men feeling emasculated by not being able to tip
https://freakonomics.com/2013/08/lessons-from-a-no-tipping-restaurant/
Thanks for the links! Great info.
Americans seem to have developed a tipping reflex. Many are unwilling not to tip in non-tipping countries, which really annoys the locals. When I first visited China in 1997, it was a totally non-tipping country. After exposure to high-tipping foreigners the culture changed and locals complained that taxi drivers no longer wanted to pick them up.
I once heard a new resident at my community complain because he wasn’t allowed to tip. He wanted to tip the guy who drove the shuttle bus. I thought he was crazy.
I guess it annoys some locals. Apparently the taxi drivers weren’t too annoyed.
Btw those tip prompts have made it into some checkouts in Europe and the UK as well, and not always at traditional local rates.
Think of it like being some big city big shot walking into a small town bar and throwing cash around to show how important he is. That’s the way it’s perceived in some countries.
And some professionals actually get a bit upset by the cultural insensitivity. I’ve seen European ski guides say to US clients that they are professionals and their rate is enough and it is better to share a drink in friendship.
Yes, I’ve encountered folks who appreciate clients/customers tipping according to their (the recipient’s) cultural norms. I’ve also encountered others happy to have the larger than normal tip (from people who either don’t know better or feel uncomfortable giving what seem like small tips).
To be clear, I’m not making an argument for how people should tip. I personally try to follow whatever the local custom is, but that has no bearing on my point, which is just that it’s a bit difficult to generalize with any confidence about what the locals think.
The locals who post on the travel board I follow are very clear about their opinion. Locals might accept a tip out of politeness while deprecating the offer. Everything I have read agrees that in Japan offering a tip is an insult. Especially trying to hand someone cash directly.
So now McDonald’s do table service with those liitle self serve numbers but you have no other human interaction other than the person bringing it – tip or not?
The generational differences in tipping probably reflect differences in discretionary income. While one could argue that those who can’t afford to tip 20% or more shouldn’t eat in a sit-down restaurant or should do so less often so that they can afford a larger tip, restaurants would suffer from their reduced patronage.
Perhaps, but aren’t boomers struggling lower income retires? 😎
I like your final paragraph. While I usually know nothing about the workers’ personal situation, I can sense when a manual laborer is doing hard or difficult work, or a server is busy but doing their best to give me good service, and I’m inclined to tip them to show my respect. I often pay with plastic, provided no cash adjustment is added to the bill, but leave cash for the tip. As for exempting tips from income taxes, I’ll leave that to the tax and economy experts.
Dick,
Another excellent essay! I may not always agree with your point of view, but on the subject of tipping I do.
Our minimum tip is 20%. And we try to tip in cash whenever we can.
We always tip deliverymen and service people.
As you point out we, too, are fortunate enough to have the funds we need. Others are not so lucky.
Sometimes the waiter/server/barista/bartender at a favorite place remembers us and we’re greeted with a nice smile and a wonderful attitude.
Also, one of my favorite cousins – she had a GREAT sense of humor – who, unfortunately has passed on, worked as a waitress to help pay for her college. The stories she would tell about customers and their tipping …
My tips start at 25% and they do fluctuate. Servers I see standing around it they aren’t busy and not stopping to check on our table may get a slight reduction. When other servers have perfect timing, keep an eye on our needs, refilling our drinks when they see the need, they do get a higher to.
A question that came to my mind is…. I wonder how much do servers tip servers when they go out to eat🤔. Just wondering
But I also have a base on my tips because I believe the top should be aligned with the service proceeded not just the price of the meal
I have no issue with tipping when we go to a restaurant, or when we get food or furniture delivered. There’s clearly personalized service involved — somebody’s going the extra mile for my benefit. But what about when I phone in a food order to the local sandwich shop, and then walk over there to pick up a sandwich that I eat at home? Or what about when we go to the local bakery and pick up a couple of croissants or a baguette? I find myself tipping in these situations — the tip percentage is there on the payment screen, so it’s clearly now expected — but I’m not happy about it. I feel like this is no different from walking into any store and picking out a few items. Will we soon be tipping at the grocery store? Where should we draw the line?
I agree. I never tip when I’m the one who picks it up. I used to go to a restaurant where the lowest tip was 10% when you picked up your order. They refused to add a zero option. I stopped going there.
Everyone now expects a tip; I don’t think so.
What about a bad service? I don’t tip either, but several servers were rude enough to demand it.
In this case, we always leave a nominal tip, not the percentage suggested on the screen, in the same way we would put money into a tip jar at the counter.
The tip is on the payment screen because whoever developed the app chose to put it there, not because every business using the app decided their employees should be tipped. If I didn’t tip in a given business before they installed those screens, I don’t tip afterwards.
Expect that to get worse if tips are exempted from taxation. Not saying they should or shouldn’t be, just foresee growth in the expectation of more tips for more things.
I don’t see that happening any more than exempting SS, but you have a valid point regarding the reaction.
If the clerk grabs an item, puts in on the counter, rings it up and turns the screen around for me to select a gratuity, I press “none”. If he or she does something for me, such as makes me a cappuccino I tip.
If I order online I add a tip regardless if I pick up. But if I went to a bakery usually not. On the other hand, if there is a tip jar, I might more often than not. Sometimes it’s just the change from the order though.
My local bagel shop has a tip jar. When they make my bagel with my to order fixings I tip.
If we have food delivered — which means somebody prepared it and somebody else brought it to our house — I tip 20%. But if I’m going to tip for food I pick up — some preparation involved, but no delivery — shouldn’t the tip be less? Perhaps 10% or 15%? I’m not trying to be cheap about this, just rational. Like others, I think the whole tipping thing has spun out of control, and I’d like to settle on a set of guidelines that make sense.
I question all tips. Tips should be given when someone did ABOVE the expected service. I don’t see why I should pay a tip for every delivery. Why food delivery deserves a tip where my mailman, Amazon, Walmart, and Target don’t. They delivered many more items to my house.
Should I tip my Uber driver? She came to my house; I entered, she drove, and I exited. That is her job; she owns the car, she can work flexible hours. I don’t see above the expected service.
Near us there is an excellent local PC, phone repair shop. If you walk in with a small problem, the guys would help you for free. One guy would spend only 5 minutes with you, another 15 minutes. This is a much higher value than the above. Do you pay a $50 tip? Do you know how much knowledge and experience are required for this answer? Without the fix, your laptop or phone may not work at all.
During Covid, when someone brought food out to my car and often put it in the trunk, I tipped well. Post Covid, if I were doing take out, and went in and picked up the food, I would not tip. I don’t tip at bakeries, although I do tip barristas if they bring the drink to me. When I moved to the US in the 70s you often saw little cards that pre-calculated different tip percentages. I think they were for 5%, 10% and 15%. There is no good reason for the increase in the percentage.
Ah tipping. The old subject where everyone can say how magnamimous they are while getting judgey about others.
I would observe that tipping in the US seems in recent years to have got a little out of hand with all sorts of places that didn’t used to be the norm soliciting tips and the “precalculated for your convenience” screen based systems presenting a choice like 20%-25%-30%. What happened to the idea that 15% was a standard tip for good service?
There are some people based services ( outside restaurant/waitstaff etc) it seems to me that customers already pay handsomely for, yet employers are quite happy pointing their staff towards customers to make up the perceived shortfall in their earnings. There is I think a problem with employees not negotiating properly with their employers.
I’m a generous tipper, but refuse to tip for ordinary cashier transactions/counter service or when buying items from employees who are paid regular wages. It HAS gotten out of hand. Everyone has their jar out now.
“I’m older than baby boomers, I always tip. Are those differences telling us something – perhaps about respect for others?”
No. You happen to be someone in their 80s whose baseline tip is 20%, while others tip much lower or don’t, but that doesn’t suggest to me that they have less “respect for others”.
I agree with basically everything else.
I’ll add that one thing I do appreciate and tend to raise my tip for is attitude. You’re right, my salary didn’t go up on those rare days when I was a pleasure to be around. Then again, I wasn’t in the service industry. The people were talking about are.
This isn’t a policy of mine at all, it just happens organically. Their good mood puts me in a good mood and makes me want to give them more (and also to ask for their manager and tell them their person was great).
Don’t get me wrong. Everyone who serves me and isn’t a downright jerk gets a good tip, but those people who seem to enjoy doing it and make my day probably get more.
Not tipping or tipping very low says something about the person and their relationship to others. I’m open to ideas.
I agree, attitude can be a factor.
Cuts both ways. Once had a situation where the food was both late and burnt/tepid. The waiter compounded the problem by touching me on the shoulder and repeatedly calling me “my friend”. Too right I stiffed him then sought out the manager to get the uneaten food taken of the bill with a bit of robust feedback about the waiter’s fake chumminess.
We rarely eat at expensive restaurants. Between lunches with friends and dinners with my wife, we eat at casual places 5 or so times a week, where my tip is around 30%. Why 30%? Because those servers do it all; they seat us, take our orders, bring us the food, check on us, and bus the table after we leave. They work much harder than many servers at expensive places who earn a lot more due to those prices.
I have a friend many years older than me, we take turns paying. We often sit and talk long after we are done eating. The servers take great care of us, keeping our glasses full with those free refills. My old friend only calculates a 15% tip, so I always throw some extra money on the table as he walks away.
I do agree with some folks that tipping has gone a bit off the rails in some places where employees are already being paid above the minimum wage. I’ll still tip, but not as generous.
Good article, Dick, especially agree with your first paragraph. It is how I view tipping also. It is always good to be generous. Chris
It’s even better to pay people a living wage, with health care and pension plans. As is the practice in other countries like Japan, Australia, France etc. etc. N.B. The service in those countries is just fine, without a lot of fake friendliness.
Agreed Kathy. Maybe if people earned a living wage they wouldn’t have to rely on government assistance in the form of Medicaid and Earned Income Tax Credits. They would pay more into Social Security and have a more secure retirement as a result.
I’m not sure if we understand the implications of living wage. Easy to say.