More on the Denver Post’s Tipping “Norms”

Following on from my earlier post on tipping, and for anyone interested, below is the “guide” the Post published as to tipping norms these days – with the 20 percent applicable for dining out.

Point to remember dining out: You tip on what the bill would come to before you factor in coupons or 2-for-1 deals. You might be getting that second entree for free, but the waiter is still schlepping it out. Don’t begrudge the full total whether he or she is black or white! .

Barista: No tip required, but many people drop the loose change or $1 into the tip jar. .

Bartender: $1 per drink, or 15 percent of the total tab. If you eat a meal at the bar, tip according to the rule-of-thumb for waiters. .

Maitre d': $5-$25 for special efforts. .

Delivery: $3 for something like Chinese takeout. .

Coat check: $1 per coat.

Bellman: $1-$2 per bag.

Concierge: $5-$20, depending on the service. No need to tip for directions, but if they score you last-minute reservations at a hot restaurant, $5 is in order. .

Housekeeper at motel, hotel: $2-$5 per night. .

Parking valet: Opinions vary, but $2-$5 seems the norm. .

Room service: $5 minimum, though make sure a gratuity is not already included in the check. .

Shuttle bus driver: $1-$2 if baggage is handled. .

Cab driver: 10 percent, $2-$5 minimum.

Personal service: .

Barber/Stylist: 10-20 percent.

Spa service: 15-20 percent.

Shoeshine: $2-$5.

Furniture delivery: $5-$20, or at least a cold drink.

Mover: $15-$25 per person .

Footnote: A certain racist blogger has opined that he’d not give “a cent” to any waiter or waitress of color that “stunk” (i.e. affected his racist olfactory nerves) no matter how they were otherwise presented or their politeness, level of service. One hopes that if this is his guide, he keeps to his scarce appearances at all dining emporiums, period. At least those that aren't cracker havens. It could be the servers in question are working so hard – all day long –they have no chance at all to “freshen up”. It might also be that he has a cancer of the nasal septum or related problem or.... it's all in his fat head and needs some ECT. It’s easy to carp when all you have to do is sit home and collect a check from Uncle Sam every month – while also screaming/blogging that the “liberals” (“libtards”) want to turn the country into a government-run ward for the state!

The "New" Tipping Standard is 20%? Gimme A Break!

Scene at Panorama Restaurant at the Fortress HohenSalzburg in Austria. Gratuity is built into the tab, so there is no 'tipping'. Why can't the U.S. have such a rational system? Ans. It's dominated by Neoliberal 'free market' capitalists!

"Can you imagine 1920s’ steelworkers in Pittsburgh, their faces stained with soot and grime, paying each other’s wages while their mill bosses pleaded poverty? That’s essentially what’s happening now in a merry-go-round circle-jerk of dream economics."  - Article on tipping, on salon.com


The quote shown above will, of course, shock most 'Muricans accustomed as they are to tipping for whatever service is supplied, especially at restaurants. But the point is salient. We have hard working people, who may put in numerous long hours each week at everything from construction, to teaching, to landscaping and even waiting tables - who then want to eat out once - and are expected to subsidize the meager wages of the wait staff. If you think about it, it's as nonsensical as the notion of 1920s' steel workers paying each others' wages while their bosses laugh.

In a similar vein, wait staff are subject to an empire where people like Hermann Cain have dictated wages no higher than $2.13 /hour, expecting the dining public will make up the rest ....in tips. Never mind most of these owner honchos don't even have the self-respect or decency to at least offer their staff health benefits or even sick days ....thereby limiting the circulation of  the stomach flu when it makes its yearly rounds (say if one or more servers is ill with it).

Then, in the midst of this, an article in The Denver Post five days ago sought to educate we, the hoi polloi, who are now expected to cough up a wage subsidy via tips: of 20 percent!   According to the Post article:


" Industry experts say that about $40 billion in tips are given each year. In May 2012, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed the median hourly wage for restaurant servers was $8.92, including tips. And a 2012 PayScale survey found that waiters made 58 percent of their income from tips.

Tipping may be an outmoded and unfair way of paying someone — and there is a small amount of industry buzz about whether restaurant workers should be salaried, or tips built into the check — but the bottom line is that this system won't change any time soon, not in this country.

For many service workers, tips are a lifeline. No tips, no rent, no groceries."


Which, of course, is despicable. And why should it not change?   When we traveled in Germany and Austria 4 months ago, we encountered perhaps one restaurant out of more than 30 which actually had tipping - and that was American-owned!  See e.g.  http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2013/06/not-being-expected-to-tip-at-restaurant.html

As I noted in the earlier blog post, the system in the U.S.  is really a very poor one, where wait staff basically sign on as indentured servants whose miserly (normal) scale pay, at $2.13 /hr. is usually quickly snatched up by the employer to pay whatever "expenses" he can think of, with the employee then scrambling to make enough in tips to pay the rent, or just groceries.  Worse, none of the wait staff in the U.S. get anywhere near the two full weeks vacation that wait staff get in Germany, Austria. Or the health benefits. Why not? Because in this cheapskate Neoliberal bastion few want to pay the taxes that would support decent living wages or benefits for everyone,  Instead we read sneering, condescending codswallop to the effect "no one ought to stay in those jobs anyway!". Yeah, right, and keep walking....don't look at the stats which show the U.S. has even lower levels of mobility than Slovakia or Barbados.

A salon.com piece on tipping  observed:

"People fall over themselves to brag of their tipping prowess and, despite the inherent and obvious injustice of a massive, scarcely-paid workforce scraping and begging for a wage, there has yet to be a true revolt of tipped employees. In a lottery-minded, American Idol culture, workers are loath to give up the chance for a Saudi Sheik to tip them a million dollars as reward for preparing a great smoothie."

The last line is especially apropos and accounts for the reason many in the service industry are loathe to change to a wage-based system. (By way of reference, at the restaurant we ate in Salzburg - featured in the graphic shown, 18% was automatically built into the total tab. This generates typical salaries of $35k- 40k a year with health benefits and paid vacations.)  I bring this up because waiting for a "lotto-sized" tip to push one into the middle class, is basically an immature and jaundiced perception .  Yet one guy who wrote in response to the Post's piece insisted he'd hate the salaried alternative because, get this, it meant "being trapped in socialism".  His reasoning: Well, as a salaried employee - even with benefits - he'd be paid exactly like everyone else, and there'd be no way to shine, get more tip money and rise above the rabble!

This kind of thinking is exactly what's wrong with too many in this country, who also believe taxes need to be always cut rather than increased. It also explains why one can never expect to see any "true revolt of tipped employees". Why should there be, if they all  - or most - believe they can get ahead of their brethren more via tips?  Never mind they still have to cough up for health care and get no paid vacation or sick days.

But they need to think about this scenario: what if the economy really dives into the toilet again? What if a new war, say on Iran or Syria, breaks out in the Middle East and oil prices spike to $300 a barrel, while the stock market collapses like a house of cards? What if the country's credit rating is degraded to BBB or less, on account of no agreement regarding the upcoming debt ceiling increase? Think people will pour into restaurants then, and even if they do - be able to afford even a 10% tip, far less the 20 % demanded by the Denver Post?

Yes, of course, all this could mean restaurants lay off more, but then many of the working public will also be laid off too. Those wait staff who remain - and bear in mind all restaurants won't close - will be paid living wages because they'd have to be amongst the best to be retained. With that in place they will be more likely to garner self-respect instead of grafting for tips.

Grafting? Think of the word "servicing" itself, as the salon.com article notes:

"Tipping makes us into slaves and masters simultaneously in a confused, kinetic, and highly kinky social model. The service industry model carries over into the bedroom with the modern emphasis on oral sex and “servicing” one’s partner. And it is cross-cultural; the service industry accounts for most jobs in the post-industrial West — up to 80 percent in the US, a country that has exported most of its industry to cheaper places ."


Back to the Denver Post.  We read:

" In some circles, notably Cornell University professor Michael Lyon, there has been talk about discontinuing the practice of restaurant tipping and adopting the European model, where waitstaff are considered professionals supported by salaries and benefits.

On a Freakonomics podcast in late spring, host Stephen Dubner asked Lyon, who has written dozens of academic papers on tipping, about what he would change about the practice.

'You know,' Lynn replied. 'I think I would outlaw it.'

According to Lynn, there is enough race and gender disparity in how much servers get tipped (blond women more, blacks less) that it's an ethically dubious way of rewarding workers."

Then why do it? According to the Post, well it's all too bad, but we are "stuck with it" and "it won't change anytime soon". Why not? Why such resignation?  Imagine if the early civil rights protestors in the 1960s had just given up after their first refusal of service at a bus stop café?  The South would still be hostage to the Jim Crow laws!

Maybe the best way to get the system to initiate change would be  externally, i.e. for Joe Q. Public to cease all tipping forthwith. Nothing, Not one red cent. Not one thin dime. Then what? There will be only two choices when the staff rise up in rebellion (unless they are zombies) : the restaurants will all have to close down - they will claim they "can't pay actual wages" etc. (which is horse pockey) OR, they will start paying salaries to staff as is done in Europe - where wait staff are professionals and are treated as such.

Will existing wait staff scream at this proposal? Undoubtedly! Because they lack the confidence to see it could work, and - or, they may be content to remain in the non-professional bracket, and endlessly grafting for tips to make do....or favoring the "lotto" mindset, hoping that one fine day a rich Saudi prince  gives them a $1m tip so they can start their own business....or retire early. 


 It's always nice to dream, no?
   

Not Being Expected To Tip At A Restaurant: More Americans Need to Experience It

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Split scene at Panorama Restaurant at the Fortress HohenSalzburg in Austria

One of the terrific aspects of travel in Germany and Austria was a firm 'Nein!' on any expectation of having to tip. Wherever we went, whether in Munich, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, the Zugspitze, Innsbruck or the HohenSalzburg Panorama Restaurant in Salzburg - see image- there was zero expectation of customer gratuity.

Our last night with long time German friends Elli and Reinhart we spent at the  Bräustüberl  Restaurant (actually located in old Garmisch, http://www.braeustueberl-garmisch.de/ ) I asked Reinhart the reasons for the absence of gratuities for servers in Germany. He laughed over a tall brew of Krönig Ludwig and replied: "It's because we believe in paying them real wages here that they can live off!"

He explained that the wage scales were such that health insurance was provided for as well as vacation time and pension benefits. There was simply no need to task a customer to come up with extra dough which, as he knew (from several visits to the States) was merely customer subsidy - letting the employer off the hook. He insisted: "If your restuarants in the States even raised their prices barely a dollar across the board they could afford to pay more decent wage instead of expecting the customer to do what the employer ought to."

He had a point. The system in the U.S. then is really a very poor one, where wait staff basically sign on as indentured servants whose miserly scale pay, at $2.13 /hr. is usually quickly snatched up by the employer to pay whatever "expenses" he can think of, with the employee then scrambling to make enough in tips to pay the rent, or just groceries.  Worse and worse, I wager none of the wait staff in the U.S. get anywhere near the two full weeks vacation that wait staff get in Germany, Austria. I told Reinhart that they were more or less stuck with the "Herman Cain" model of restaurant compensation, reflected in their experiencing triple the poverty rate  of the general U.S. workforce.

Fortunately, a new light seems to have emerged at the proverbial end of the U.S. Miserly Tunnel. Well, at least at one New York City venue: Sushi Yasuda, an upscale place in midtown Manhattan, has opted to provide its staff with a decent salary and benefits package that includes vacation days, sick leave and health insurance. Instead of a tip line, the restaurant notifies their patrons at the bottom of the check:

“Following the custom in Japan, Sushi Yasuda’s service staff are fully compensated by their salary. Therefore gratuities are not accepted.”

Hey! Sounds an awful lot like the custom in most of Germany and Austria!

Of course, inevitably, some customers will always be so conditioned that they give tips whatever the new policy. But at Sushi Yasuda,  any tips the staff does receive goes straight to the house, rather than staff. Meanwhile, food prices have been raised an extra 15 percent to compensate wages, but there’s been no apparent change in customer volume.

Sushi Yasuda’s Co-owner, Scott Rosenberg, told The Price Hike

“The risk is that your prices appear to be high on the menu. But if you have faith in what you’re serving, and how you’re serving it, you know that when your customers have a good meal and look at their final tally it’s going to be around the same.”

Hey, now there's a novel thought! Have faith in what you're serving, then set ther prices accordingly - to meet the goal of providing a living wage for your staff! If your grub is in any good, people will come! They sure do in Germany, and over there the prices are marked in euros with one euro equivalent to about $1.30 U.S.  The meal I had at  Bräustüberl  featured roast duck and potatoes, salad with a dark German beer and ditto for Janice. It came to some 54 euros (27 euro each) or $70.20 U.S. And worth every cent by the way. Besides the server so enjoyed our table we each received a free round of Schnapps.

I would wager a similar model could be employed here in the U.S. say at place like Applebees or Olive Garden and with lower prices relative to what we paid in Europe. For example, Olive Gardens in Denver currently have a special 3-course special Italian dinner for $12.95. I am willing to bet that this might be offered instead at $15.95 and customers will still come and buy it if it's that good. The extra money can then be used to pay real server wages.

Alas, this is perhaps more a pipe dream than realistic. The chains - chain restaurants are more likely committed to the 'Herman Cain' model of meager wage and scrambling for tips - especially if the competition doesn't change but sticks to low dinner costs. This means a large portion of the U.S. work force will never really be able to improve its lot and Americans - perpetually anticipating low food prices - will come to expect restaurants deliver them as is their wont.

It’s Time To Get Rid of Tipping! (And Indentured Servitude)

“In the American democracy to be servile is incompatible with citizenship. Every tip given in the United States is a blow at our experiment in democracy. The custom announces to the world….that we do not believe practically that ‘all men are created equal’…….Those Americans who dislike self-respect in servants are undesirable citizens; they belong in an aristocracy.” – William R. Scott, 1916

(Shown by Chris Hayes in a freeze frame this morning)


Former waitress Victoria Bruton, this morning on Chris Hayes’ ‘UP’ (in his topic to do with the food industry) made one of the most compelling arguments ever for getting rid of the institution of tipping in restaurants. As she put it to Chris, when asked if she’d have preferred a straight weekly wage to tips:


“Oh, no question! By the end of the week I know how many hours I’ve worked so I know how much I will actually get to pay my bills. I no longer have to say ‘Oh, I need to make 300 dollars! Come on, 300 dollars!’ "


Her point is that with even a minimum wage she'd have been better off because she no longer would have to gamble on whether she could pay her bills, or make a difficult choice between paying the gas bill and the electric bill. This is germane because the ‘tipping minimum wage’ of $2.13 an HOUR, hasn’t changed in 22 years!


Most Americans who tip, including me (on the odd occasion of going to eat out), think they are rewarding service well done, not actually paying most of a worker’s wage. But with the tipping wage as low as 2.13 an hour this is often the case. As Ms. Bruton observed, her tipping minimum usually boiled down to zero at the end of her work week, thanks to taxes, withholding etc. and so all her actual “wage” needed to be from tips.


Of course, this is an abomination. The tip, if it exists at all, should be on TOP of a basic decent wage (at least $8 an hour) not substitute for it! This has always been the problem I have had with tipping culture in the U.S. By contrast, in Europe, the restaurants incorporate a gratuity in the final tab and this is always in addition to the workers’ regular wage which is a livable wage. No customer has to remotely decide how much to add to the tab because the bill is already completed. No wonder then that staff in Europe enjoy a higher standard of living. They can actually afford to pay off any college loans!


Chris’ guest Saru Jayaraman also observed that 7 states in the U.S. provide tips on top of a decent minimum wage, including California, Nevada and Oregon. She also pointed out that having a real minimum wage applied to the workers in the restaurant industry would not increase expenses more than 10 cents or so per worker per day and so the claim that restaurateurs would have to raise prices by twenty percent or more is nonsense.


Waiters and waitresses in the U.S. also need to be aware of how the debased ‘grub for tips’ culture in the U.S. came about. As noted by Chris in his brief historical retrospective, the agreement was made in the 1990s, when the likes of Herman Cain agreed to raise the federal minimum wage if the tipping minimum wage was to he “kept at $2.13 an hour forever”.


Forever! Are you effing kidding me? With inflation ever going on and eating up real wages, you will keep restaurant workers at the level of slaves or indentured servants?


Alas, with our predominantly Confederate slave-labor favoring congress, it appears any changes will have to come from the bottom up as opposed to top down. Unless restaurant workers themselves agitate for a real federal minimum wage they can live on, they will be hoist on the petard of gambling whether their tips will close their budget gaps at the end of the week.


Given that the restaurant biz inevitably declines during recessions (and we may be in for another with the sequester) tips becomes a dicey way to earn a living.


The good news? As Ms. Jayaraman  noted, there will be a bill introduced Tuesday in Congress, co-sponsored by Sen. Tom Harkin and George Miller in the House to “finally raise the tipping minimum wage for the first time in two decades”.


The bad news? Since the House is ruled by pro-Confederate, Tea Party austerity zealots-  with boners for major deficit reduction-   it is as likely that bill will pass as that extraterrestrials will land and abduct all the Tea- Peas  for servitude in the Zeta Reticuli system!