76
Americans are confused, frustrated by new tipping culture, study finds
(www.washingtonpost.com)
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2023
76 points (100.0% liked)
U.S. News
2244 readers
17 users here now
News about and pertaining to the United States and its people.
Please read what's functionally the mission statement before posting for the first time. We have a narrower definition of news than you might be accustomed to.
Guidelines for submissions:
- Post the original source of information as the link.
- If there is a paywall, provide an archive link in the body.
- Post using the original headline; edits for clarity (as in providing crucial info a clickbait hed omits) are fine.
- Social media is not a news source.
For World News, see the News community.
This community's icon was made by Aaron Schneider, under the CC-BY-NC-SA 4.0 license.
founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
The tipping for Uber Eats/Door Dash drives me up a wall. If I'm getting one small bag of food, why would I pay the delivery driver a percentage of the cost of the food? Why should a delivery from Chez Snooty tip more than a delivery from McDonalds if they're both the same amount of work for the delivery driver and they're providing the exact same service?? Now the LOWEST option in the app that's not custom is 18% and it defaults to 20%. WTF?? I already pay extra for the delivery!! You're supposed to use that money to pay your employees. If you can't, then your business model isn't sustainable!
/deep breath
Fwiw, tipping based on price is probably intended to be a heuristic for tipping based on volume or difficulty - someone who orders 4 meals from McDonald's should tip more than someone who orders one.
If the person is walking or biking, sure. If they're driving, then whether they get lucky with the lights should matter more for the tip cost than whether it was 1 small bag or 2 medium ones.
All I'm saying is the guy juggling 5 drinks deserves a bigger tip.
Not the original commenter, but the guy juggling 5 drinks deserves no tip. He deserves a fair pay and the stuff the customer buys should be priced in such a way it enables fair pay.
I am not from the US and delivery drivers here don't even expect a tip. I order my stuff, pay exactly what the menu said (and maybe a deliver fee, which is fine to me, you then usually have the option to come and pick it up without that fee) and get my food 30 minutes later.
Tipping is an extremely bad practice that makes the pay of people unpredictable and depending on their situation can make a day with bad tipping a problem for them.
Stop tipping.
I'm glad tipping culture isn't required for you. I agree with the cons of tipping. If you have practical advice I will consider it, but I don't think not tipping workers who are currently depending on the tip for income is the play. I do not have a magic wand that will change payment schemes. I can lower said unpredictability by not tipping at all I suppose, but that doesn't seem the right approach either.
If tipping was stopped all around this would force employers to be responsible for the pay of their employees.
This can only be achieved by holding the employers accountable. Buy from companies that pay fair wages. Don't buy from those that rely on tips. Vote with your money.
I have known one restaurant in my city that (temporarily) went tipless - that's it.
This is a really bad take. If you think their business model doesn't support its workers, don't engage with the company. To choose to do so anyway in a country where tipping is the standard and choose not to tip, you are exploiting workers. The employer may be exploiting them as well, but taking part in that system and deciding to skip out on the part that makes the job a living wage is actively malicious.
I drive a taxi. If people don't tip, I shrug it off, but they're basically asking me to subsidize their ride. I do not make enough to live without tips. I'm not going to charge myself extra by getting upset about it, but it does impact me financially. And often people who don't tip are folks who are much better off monetarily than I am.
I disagree.
You should not look at the customer to make up extra payment so your wage becomes bearable. This way you are pointing in the wrong direction for a fair pay.
The customer is not the one responsible for you making enough money. Your employer is.
Employers are also the only people gaining anything from tipping. The laws in the US actually allow employers to pay less than minimum wage if the worker receives tips: https://www.dol.gov/general/topic/wages/wagestips Since tipping is not predictable the employer wins by having to pay the worker less. The worker loses.
Also you as the worker are responsible to track and pay taxes on the tips you received, not your employer: https://www.irs.gov/businesses/small-businesses-self-employed/tip-recordkeeping-and-reporting
I understand it sounds scary when I say "Stop tipping" because it sounds like less money to you, but don't look at me, the customer, for this. Look at the employer. Stop tipping.
Edit: I agree with your take to stop engaging with companies that rely on tipping to change this, though. I think that was not clear from my comment.
If you think that workers aren't being paid an equitable wage and you continue to spend money on something that isn't essential, you're complicit. The employer may be putting the idea of underpaying their workers on the table, but you're the one allowing him to continue to operate. He doesn't exist in a vacuum.
The entitlement here comes both from the greedy employer and from the greedy consumer. Greed is wrong regardless of what side of the counter you stand on. No ethical consumption under capitalism, sure, but that doesn't mean you have to participate in stiffing someone.
Totally agree with this.
You've brought up very good points. As long as consumers support this it will stay the same.
It's not the customers responsibility to save a worker who chose to take a job that doesn't pay a livable wage.
I think people do have a responsibility for the systems they're complicit in, but I also think that we actually owe one another something as human beings, and most people seem not to.
It's true that the people using the services are also enablers, but I don't hold them responsible either, when it comes to wage related questions.
The employer is responsible for paying a livable wage, but the employee is responsible for choosing to do said work.
If nobody did, the system would collapse and change in a month. No amount of never tipping/feedback can fix what's broken, only the employees can.
That doesn't really line up with reality though. We're living in a world where the gap between the rich and the poor is expanding and wealth is being consolidated. Minimum wage fails to be enough to support a person, but most service-oriented companies seem to manage to get away with paying it pretty readily.
Workers can try to unionize, but that's an uphill battle and it doesn't immediately guarantee a living wage for their labor. In the case of a lot of service jobs, it may make a lot more sense individually to just get out of the industry rather than try to improve it.
Like, I've worked in places that would benefit from a stronger bargaining position for workers, but that doesn't mean unionizing is going to be achievable in all of those contexts.
And for some jobs, tipping is literally what makes them sustainable. Outside of a metro area, tipping may well be the reason you even have a taxi company or any restaurants at all. I don't know about you, but I like living in a world where we get the stuff that we need. To me, that means that I should participate in those systems in good faith when I use them rather than subverting them and making the margins thinner for the most vulnerable people involved.
The reality is that this issue only exists in the US, if we're talking about first world countries. It's a cultural problem in attitudes.
Noone should be tipped, but paid a living wage by their employer.
It's this. Without the tip (or a higher upcharge in delivery fee to earmark some for the driver) there'd be no incentive for drivers to take the job. If the company didn't take the delivery fee, there'd be no structure, like apps or a unified company distributing tax papers, etc.
Beyond that, since drivers typically choose which individual jobs to pick up, there'd be no incentive to take larger or more distanced orders.
The problem is that the business model doesn't work in the first place and is largely on life support being propped up by tipping culture.
I work as a delivery driver (NOT gig work, hired by my company directly) in a city in a state that pays me a living minimum wage plus a living mileage. What confuses me the most is how pissy my coworkers get about non-tippers. Shaking their drinks, dropping their food, getting all huffy.
I literally don't care. Some nights have been horrific nights with 4 dollars total in tips, but I think most nights I end up with 30 to 50 anyway just because of tip culture.
This is exactly why I just don't use these services at all. It's not good for me, it's not good for their employee, it's not good for the place that I'm buying the stuff from, it's only good for GrubHub or Uber eats or whatever the fuck. It's rent seeking behavior pure and simple.