Right on!! I’m halfway packed and booking tickets!!!
The owner of the salon I work at gets tipped all the time. The customers that tip say that she does the same work as the employees do so why shouldn’t she get the same courtesy? Besides, after paying us, and insurance, and the rent, etc. it turns out she doesn’t make much more than we do. And yes, she does raise prices but you can only do that so many times.
As an avid gambler, the only place in a casino where I feel tipping is obligated is to the cocktail waitresses. 50 cents to a dollar per drink is the norm; I usually go for a dollar, with an extra dollar every few drinks.
It is not obligatory to tip the dealer/stickman/etc., and most I’ve talked to don’t expect it unless you’re winning a fair amount. Dealers can be very responsive to heavy tippers–I’ve had dealers tell me what the hole card is (if they’ve checked under an ace), and one that even occasionally forgot to take my money when I lost. Card counters have to tread the line–excessive tipping can wipe out your advantage, but it can also lead to better penetration (that is, the dealer deals out more cards).
Pit bosses also notice good tips, and will be more inclined to offer meal or other comps to the good tippers. (I’m a low-roller, but I tip a lot, and I get way more comps than I have any right to. The trick is to ask for them.) Note, though, that pit bosses themselves are not allowed to accept tips.
I don’t ever tip the guy in the cage who cashes in my chips. I probably would if I were a bigger roller.
Whenever I go to Vegas (which isn’t often enough), I go to the bank before I go and get $100, half in $5’s and half in $1’s, and make a roll. Then I tip everyone in sight, using the proper Vegas tipping method (peel bills off the roll while looking sideways at the tipee, then hold them lengthwise between the index and middle fingers while looking away. Imagine Robert de Niro doing it, and it’s much cooler.) Not only does it get you better service, but it just makes me feel cool.
On the other situations:
Bars: 50 cents for a draft or bottled beer, a buck for a properly pulled Guinness or a mixed drink. (If they go back to the Guinness tap a third time, that’s extra.)
Hairdresser: I don’t normally tip mine, because she’s a friend who owns the place and charges way more than I would ever pay for a haircut. She knows this, and probably wouldn’t accept a tip if I offered one.
Taxi drivers: This is one that entirely depends on service. If he’s helpful, courteous, and honest, I will tip 30 or 40%. If he’s not, I don’t have any problem asking for exact change.
Baggage guy–buck a bag.
Pizza delivery–a buck plus a buck a pie, if it’s hot. Less if the pizza is cold. This is a pet peeve of mine–a hot delivered pizza is a rarity in a college town–so I usually go get it myself.
Guys at takeout counters–I just can’t bring myself to do this one. There’s a Cajun place right across the street where I eat frequently, but their staff turnover is so high (never the same guy twice) that tipping is unlikely to result in improved service. I don’t feel obligated to tip for karma’s sake.
Oh, and you should always tip your doctor, especially if he threw a few extra Percosets on the script for you. (I’m kidding! I’m kidding!)
Dr. J
I’ve been both a waitress and a bartender so I’m generally a pretty good tipper.
Bartenders: If I’m sitting at the bar, I’ll usually run a tab and tip 20%. Otherwise, I will tip big on the first pass (say 100%) for future good service and more normally through the night.
Hairdressers: 20% but I refuse to tip anyone else involved. (i.e. should someone else wash my hair or blowdry, sorry)
Porters: $1 per bag or $5 total, whichever is higher. Occasionally this will vary, say if I’m travelling alone with my daughter. I need extra assistance and will tip accordinly.
Valets: Depends on the location, usually $5. My husband gives them more to park the car in front.
Pizza delivery: 10% on average.
Other delivery (furniture, etc.): $10 for just dropping something off in the right location. If it requires set up or assembly $20.
Dealers in casinos: A chip every now and then.
Hotel maid: I just usually leave them all of my loose change. This isn’t as stingy as it sounds, on a recent two-day trip to Tahoe, I left the maid about $8 in loose coin. (And I don’t play the slots.) Who knows where it all comes from, I believe it breeds in the bottom of my purse.
Handymen, contractors, etc: Drinks and an occasional lunch. Coffee, tea, soda, bottled water, maybe a beer at the end of the day. I’ll order pizzas if they’re here all day and don’t have plans for lunch.
Strippers: Well, my husband tips them very well. 
Barber - It costs 8 bucks for a haircut at the shop I go to, and I just give him a 10 and he keeps the change. He’s my “regular” barber, so it’s kind of this unspoken agreement we have.
Porter - I’ve always carried the bags in myself.
Bartender - A buck a drink.
Pizza guy - The change from the total.
Strippers - 5 bucks for a lapdance, and while they’re on stage, 5 to 6 bucks per 3 minute song. But I’ll admit, for the strippers I don’t care to see, I’ll just hang out in the back so I don’t have to tip.
Taxi driver - Never rode in one, but I guess I’d give him the change from the fare.
Valet - A buck.
Limo driver - 20 to 30 bucks for the whole night of chauffeuring which is usually about 4 to 5 hours.
I work (occasionally) as a whitewater raft guide. It never even occurs to many/most customers that tips are appropriate.
It is not like waiting tables, where it is assumed that tipping will comprise most of the pay. But the pay for guiding is universally very low, and tips really make a big difference to guides. So:
If you like your ride, tip your guide.
A nice, generous tip is $10 per day per person. So a family of 3 on a one-day trip could tip $30. More is appreciated, of course. Less is also appreciated. Any tip at all is appreciated. (Well, anything but a Chick tract…)
My hubby is going rafting this weekend, I’ll let him know that tipping is not just a city in China.
first off i’d like to say:
Pizza delivery - depends on speed. if it’s early 15% - 20% on time 10%, late a buck. (if it’s raining a little extra)(the places i order from my average bill is like $30 or more. I also use the same scale for chinese food delivery Hair stylist - usually $5 but more if she’s wearing a low cut shirt and bends over a lot (only kidding1 Ow! Stop slapping me!)
Bellhop (in the better hotels). - $5
Baggage handler (in airports, etc). - 2 bucks per bag at the skycap… nothing at the counter
Maitre d’ (in swanky restaurants). - depends on service and snootiness, but usually a 5 spot
Bartenders - 1 or 2 a drink depending on the speed and how busy the bar is.
Other areas:
Cabs/towncars - depending on driver friendliness 10-20% of the tab
Grocery Delivery - $10 if they put them in the kitchen 5 if they don’t
Areas that seem to expect tips now that get none:
Barrista’s (coffee people) like starbucks or such.
Any food employee that works behind a counter and hands you food but doesn’t add to the service in any way.
Video store employees
People who work at theaters (movie or otherwise)
Tipping is to enhance service and the few times i have tipped these people on a return visit i have never seen enhanced service
You tip twenty bucks for THAT haircut?
{stands there smirking, as Demo has already used up all the pies on the other people who’ve commented on his post}
These days I tip the salon owner who does my hair, even though I’d always heard that this wasn’t appropriate. I simply asked her about it point blank one day and she said she’d be happy to accept my tips(!)
Several reasons why I tip her, though…
[ul]
it’s hard to find anyone who can do something with my extremely thin, baby-fine, wimpy hair; she spends a lot of time fussing over it and does a great job…well, she does the best that can be expected, anyway
she’s only been in business about a year, so she’s really not making much money yet aside from her tips; as a small business owner myself, I know what it’s like to struggle with the budget
I sold her my ragged-out '67 Chevy II and she’s promised to take me cruising in it when she finishes restoring it[/ul]
I generally tip a bit more than 20%.
Here’s one that has not been mentioned: your mechanic! We have the best mechanic and needless to say, we take care of each other.
THe Kozmo.com guy? They are delivering but, there isn’t any money exchanged.
I am starting to get sick of tipping by the way. Waitresses get paid very little and tips are expected to make up the difference but, River rafting guides??? JImminy!
There is one more person you have to tip. When your computer at work breaks down for whatever reason, and the person has to come all the way to your desk, you should always have a nicely chilled beer waiting to give to him. 
And when you need to come to the computer person’s desk, and tell them that you have something that needs to be worked on ASAP, a message from a senior director doesn’t work anywhere near as well as a sixpack for getting it pushed to highest priority status.
I have been implementing this policy everywhere I work, and so far everybody is happy with it, so I think its about time we make it into an actual tradition.
In the OP, I suggested the following approach:
Life got busy, so I never got around to initiating Stage Two, and then I forgot about the thread for awhile. But my memory got jogged, so let’s review the list, the long list, of proposed tipping situations:
Hotels:
Bellhops
Maids
Doormen (if they hail you a cab)
Concierges
Restaurants/Nightlife/Entertainment:
Bartenders
Parking Attendants
Cloakroom Attendants
Maitre d’s (maybe)
Limo drivers (when you’ve rented a bona fide limousine)
Stadium vendors
Strippers/Lapdancers
(I’m leaving out waitpersons, since the thread’s specifically not about them, and casino attendants, because that’s a whole 'nother world, AFAIAC.)
Transportation/Baggage Handling:
Cab drivers
supershuttle drivers
rental car van drivers (if help with luggage)
Baggage handlers (at airports, trains, etc.)
Tour guides & Charter bus drivers
Home Delivery:
Newspaperboy
Mail carrier
Trash Pickup
Grocery delivery (where do they do this??)
Pizza delivery
Other Lifting and Carrying:
Grocery store attendants (if they take bags to your car)
Movers
Furniture Delivery
Miscellaneous:
Hair Stylists
Tattooers/Body Piercers
Mechanics
Whitewater Raft Guides
Clowns that make the animal balloons
My question: can you keep track of all that? I sure can’t. And that’s just who gets tipped; that doesn’t cover what sort of tip is reasonable for each one.
My thesis is that the set of tipping situations and rules are just too damned complicated to expect most people to be familiar with them. What happens to me (and I’ll bet it happens to a lot of you, too) is that in most tipping situations, I’m uncomfortable because I either don’t really have a clue as to whether or not I should tip, or don’t have a good idea what an appropriate tip is.
A lot of us, I believe, finesse such situations wherever reasonable, because the discomfort of, say, carrying a few bags through an airport, is less than the discomfort of having the feeling that a tip is expected but not really knowing the rules. Hence those carts that you can rent in most airports these days, and luggage with wheels on it.
That discomfort is my real issue with tipping. The people we tip are mostly people who are providing services that are supposed to make our lives easier. But because there’s the expectation that we’re supposed to tip them, yet we don’t really know for sure whether or how much, they actually make our lives more difficult. In other words, it’s working the opposite of the way it’s supposed to.
Oh sure, we all could learn the tipping rules if they were sufficiently important to us. But most of the time, there are about 227 more urgent tasks awaiting our attention. (Like figuring out whether to stay with the same PPO again this year, and finding a reliable auto mechanic, and figuring out how to choose a good mutual fund, and remembering to check to make sure our long distance provider is giving us their best rate, and…you get the idea.) Any one of these tasks is, by itself, eminently manageable, but most of us are faced with a plethora of them. So it’s no surprise that learning the rules of tipping tends to get lost in the shuffle.
And most of the tipping situations are ones we encounter only occasionally, and we tend not to think of them until we find ourselves in them. At which point it’s too late, unless we had the foresight to program the rules into our Palm Pilot.
Anyhow, that’s my argument. Tipping may work in a wide variety of situations for those who care to learn its rules, but for (what I would guess to be) the vast majority - those of us who don’t - it makes life more of a hassle than it already is.
I’m not sure about this (feel free to ask this in GQ if you care), but my bet is that tipping originated with the landed gentry tipping commoners (other than those they directly employed) that served them. This isn’t about class warfare, so much as it is about the fact that the landed gentry didn’t have to work for a living, hence they were able to devote themselves, full time, to understanding and fulfilling their social obligations. That was their job, and that included understanding who to tip, and how much. We work for a living, and for us, learning these rules (well over two dozen tipping situations, and varying rules of what’s an appropriate tip for each one) is just one more burden taxing our limited spare time. And I believe most of us would rather not pay that tax.
I tip any kind of tour guide.
I don’t tip clowns. I avoid clowns. Clowns give me the creeps. If it’s a mime/clown hybrid it’s even worse, and if he/she/it has any kind of puppet or marionette, I run screaming and have nightmares for a week.