Well it should start with you right? Are you willing to never tip again in your entire life? If so, let us know how it goes (or maybe is going?)
Or, alternatively, maybe you don't live in a country with a tipping culture. And if so, then tipping doesn't really affect you.
People like to tip. I like to tip. Waiters and waitresses like to be tipped. My wife used to work as a waitress and would clear over $300 a night in tips alone. It's only a small minority of people who are against it.
I can't down vote your snarky comment, but yes I'd be absolutely happy to stop tipping, if the country I lived in paid fair wages to the people working in the service industry. The idea of rewarding high performers can be similarly achieved with incentive plans and at least guarantees people working in the service industry the minimum wage allowable by law. So for now, I'm going to continue tipping the culturally appropriate amount to ensure my server gets a fair wage and I will also support any activist initiative to abolish tipping.
And that's why tipping won't die because the few people who can make bank off of sob stories and bad logic.
Sorry, waiting tables is not a really complicated skill. Tipping is not related to quality of service.
Most people don't think about tipping. They do it because it's expected and maybe the waitress is hot. If pressed, they would likely prefer not to do it.
Servers are also some of the most disingenuous people I've seen when arguing about tipping. Because that top tier knows they can make a lot of money in a low-skill job. They like to complain about how much money they make and how screwed over they are by tips, but when restaurants pay a fair wage and eliminate tips, the staff abandons them for places that do tip. Why? Money.
Some people like to be in control, that's ok.
Tipping bundles a simple service task to the in most jobs needless component of giving the customer the illusion of attention. If you're a waitress by choice and tipping works for you, that's fine too, but it simply doesn't scale to a large scale gig based economy. Being able to extract that amount of tips is a skill, that not everybody has. If venues could, they probably would take money for customer facing service job opportunities to work there for tips to exploit that skill, which would be the more honest free market model in my opinion.
Waiters and waitresses HATE to NOT be tipped in a world where it's their livelihood. And studies have shown that this leads to racist, classist, and sexism within the service industry.
- Studies show that non-caucasians receive worse service because they are perceived as likely to tip less.
- Studies show that a high class restaurant server gets more in tips than a medium class restaurant, even when the food and service is of lower quality.
- Studies show that men often get tipped less than women for similar service.
Following that last point, it sounds like customer preference is shaping the demographics. If people prefer to be served by women, and tip them more, the field will skew female.
I worked a tipped job for years and hated that aspect of it. It made my income more stressful and erratic than a normal wage. I can confirm what others have pointed out, that it also reinforces stereotypes.
Like any erratic and arbitrary system there will be some winners who make out well, but it's not a great way of compensating people for work.
> Are you willing to never tip again in your entire life?
I would happily do that if I knew the server would earn a living wage even without my tip.
No one is talking about making tipping illegal. Killing tipping culture means not making food workers dependent on customers' largess and generosity to make a living wage.
Even in most countries without a tipping culture, you're free to hand over additional money to your server or cook if you feel like it. No one is stopping you.
If you're in places where non-tipping is expected and the staff are paid based on that, fine. If you're doing this in places where staff pay is determined based on expectation of tips, you may be an exemplar of what people hate about Silicon Valley dudebro culture.
It's entirely possible that restaurants in SF have shifted to non-tipping and jacked their prices up to pay higher base wages just because it's so expensive to live anywhere in that area, but in most of the country people in traditionally-tipped positions are often paid significantly below minimum wage (as low as $2.13/hour as the federal minimum, many states are higher). In California the tipped minimum wage at $11/hour is only $1/hour lower than the regular minimum wage, so not tipping may have less impact.
Restaurants in other part of the country will raise someone's paycheck if the tip didn't reach a minimum threshold. We call waiters who expect tips "wasters" here in the bay.
Or, alternatively, maybe you don't live in a country with a tipping culture. And if so, then tipping doesn't really affect you.
People like to tip. I like to tip. Waiters and waitresses like to be tipped. My wife used to work as a waitress and would clear over $300 a night in tips alone. It's only a small minority of people who are against it.