Tipping in the service industry

[LadyForCamus]

I always tip my salon girl! Jean Paul takes like, %40 of every session.

[Seraphina]

Heated debate going on right now between myself and a friend of a friend on Facebook about this very topic. She believes that aside from the food service industry, places like salons, shouldn't have tipping. She feels that there should be one set price to pay and that's that. She says that because she's a teacher, she doesn't get tips to do her job so why should someone who cuts hair for a living. 

I agree with Tibs and others who commented that workers should simply be paid a fair wage and we wouldn't need to have these discussions on tipping. I do tip around 20% to service workers. They work hard and depend on those tips.

That being said, on a slightly off-topic note, it's odd that a teacher is making the argument that since she doesn't get tips, nobody else should either. If she's a teacher, she gets 3 months including summers off every year, tenure, a pension, health insurance, union protections, I could go on. Just strange that a teacher is arguing for nickel and diming and not tipping service workers like you.

-Teresa

[Joods]

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Heated debate going on right now between myself and a friend of a friend on Facebook about this very topic. She believes that aside from the food service industry, places like salons, shouldn't have tipping. She feels that there should be one set price to pay and that's that. She says that because she's a teacher, she doesn't get tips to do her job so why should someone who cuts hair for a living. 

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I agree with Tibs and others who commented that workers should simply be paid a fair wage and we wouldn't need to have these discussions on tipping. I do tip around 20% to service workers. They work hard and depend on those tips.

That being said, on a slightly off-topic note, it's odd that a teacher is making the argument that since she doesn't get tips, nobody else should either. If she's a teacher, she gets 3 months including summers off every year, tenure, a pension, health insurance, union protections, I could go on. Just strange that a teacher is arguing for nickel and diming and not tipping service workers like you.

-Teresa

Yeah, I found that odd as well and compared her profession to mine when responding to her.

[Autumnlicious]

I tip* between 15%-20% at any restaurant that is not fast food. I also tip 20% for my local barber shop because I know they make income on a per-job basis, I like them and I know they’re servicing an expensive part of town (their commutes are at least an hour).

That said, I hate tipping. I’d rather the flat cost simply inline all that. Tipping is inherently abusive - it allows for unfair behavior in a commission, solely subject to whim. It easily breeds in a customer unreasonable entitled behavior that must be catered to. It allows someone who is having a bad day to take it out on the staff. Ultimately it’s a strong conduit for negative pushback on only one person by harming their income. That’s pretty low.

If a place is bad and it’s not excusable, I will visit it less and less. Some places I skip entirely. It’s the responsibility of the business shareholders to make it succeed and it’s not my job to discipline the waitstaff.


* tipping is for me “shift decimal place over to the left, multiply by two if easy else floor the cents value until easy to multiply by two than multiply by two”, where easy is defined as “low latency”.

[Tiberius]

There are good arguments on both sides of the tipping debate, but can we all at least agree that the state of tipping in America is mostly caused by owners not paying their workers adequate wages?

No, of course not.

Because other countries, say Spain and most southern european, pay less for minimum wage and don't have tipping. So how do you explain that?

Those countries more likely than not provide for their citizens in ways which the US does not. When you don't have to pay ridiculous prices for healthcare, then yeah, maybe a smaller minimum wage with no tipping would provide for the basic necessities.

Not to mention in most states they can pay tipped employees less as long as their tips total up more than the minimum. So that's a problem with the government's minimum wage laws, not tipping.

It's a problem with the government's minimum wage laws, but it's also a problem with owners not paying enough. There's no law that states an owner must pay their servers the bare minimum. That they do is on the owners. Tipping allows owners to not pay their staff much, instead pushing that responsibility on the customer.

So obviously tipping is a cultural thing. Also part of the reason you normally get better service in the US.

Yet a few minutes on Google reveals that studies actually say the opposite, or are at least split on the subject. It makes sense if you think about it. Given that tipping is something society expects, people give tips regardless of the service. Sure, they might tip slightly less for bad service, and they might tip slightly more for good service, but when we are talking small percentages on an already cheap meal, it's not actually that much money.

[Aliza]

I always tip my salon girl!  Jean Paul takes like, %40 of every session.

But you don't tip 40%, right?

If you do, then I need to step up my game. I tip 20% across the board unless they really piss me off with lazy service, which is almost never. Then I only tip 15%.

[Joods]

20% is the industry standard in my line of work.

[The Grand Nudger]

I tip my kids teachers all the time.  In bleach wipes, dry erase shit, bags of socks..tshirts, and jersey shorts.   If they want cash they should stop pestering me for all of that other shit and just say so.

[vulcanlogician]

Tipping is inherently abusive - it allows for unfair behavior in a commission, solely subject to whim. It easily breeds in a customer unreasonable entitled behavior that must be catered to. It allows someone who is having a bad day to take it out on the staff. Ultimately it’s a strong conduit for negative pushback on only one person by harming their income. That’s pretty low.

I hear you there. It could be noted that even hourly-wage employees in the service industry are vulnerable to such abuse. But (as you point out) tipping seems to somehow further justify such behavior.

I like to keep in mind that (even when I get subpar service) it is usually the right thing to do to leave an adequate tip. After all, perhaps the reason my service suffered was because some asshole saw fit to take his frustrations out on the human being who served us both, and I got left with the exhausted aftermath. 

If the service is inexcusably shitty, I'll leave only $1-2 (or less). Otherwise, my minimum starts at 20% and goes up from there.

[CapnAwesome]

No, of course not.

Because other countries, say Spain and most southern european, pay less for minimum wage and don't have tipping. So how do you explain that?

Those countries more likely than not provide for their citizens in ways which the US does not. When you don't have to pay ridiculous prices for healthcare, then yeah, maybe a smaller minimum wage with no tipping would provide for the basic necessities.

Not to mention in most states they can pay tipped employees less as long as their tips total up more than the minimum. So that's a problem with the government's minimum wage laws, not tipping.

It's a problem with the government's minimum wage laws, but it's also a problem with owners not paying enough. There's no law that states an owner must pay their servers the bare minimum. That they do is on the owners. Tipping allows owners to not pay their staff much, instead pushing that responsibility on the customer.

So obviously tipping is a cultural thing. Also part of the reason you normally get better service in the US.

Yet a few minutes on Google reveals that studies actually say the opposite, or are at least split on the subject. It makes sense if you think about it. Given that tipping is something society expects, people give tips regardless of the service. Sure, they might tip slightly less for bad service, and they might tip slightly more for good service, but when we are talking small percentages on an already cheap meal, it's not actually that much money.

I don't think people are not tipping in Spain because they have health care. Really people are not that deep thinking. I also don't think there was tipping in those countries before they got universal health care. So that explanation is quite a stretch.

There are still tons of non-tipping cultures with lower wages than the us you'd have to explain. Since the us actually has fairly high wages except compared to a very very small amount of countries, the explanation falls well short. Tipping is just cultural. Every culture has a different tipping custom. I don't see much of a pattern to it.

Not to mention I'd much rather get a tipped job in the us than the flat minimum wage in most European countries. The minimum wage in Europe isn't all that special and in some countries is awful. It's better in the west coast of America for sure plus you get tips.