I don’t think you’re well-travelled enough to make that sort of claim. The evidence you point to certainly doesn’t support it.
pdts
Why would a group of restaurants be incentivized to have the IRS crack down on tax avoidance by waitstaff? The OP suggested that a group of restaurants would band together. Not that the goverment would impose this rule change.
For my views on tipping, see Reservoir Dogs.
I’m in the group that finds tipping uncomfortable. I never know how much to give, and I would err on the side of more, but my husband is firmly set at 15% and my parents even less. So it’s uncomfortable in part because when I go out with them, I’m afraid the server is getting stiffed. But it isn’t a written rule. And 15% was the norm; I’m sure my husband learned that from his parents, and my parents moved up from their parents’ 10%. (Thank goodness my grandparents got too old to go out or they’d still be leaving 10%!)
It adds just a little bit of discomfort to what should be a pleasant time out. I’d much prefer just to pay the (larger) written amount for my meal and be done with it. I really like order-at-the-counter restaurants like Panera, Noodles, Chipotle, etc. that have no tipping policies because it eliminates that sense of unease about how much to leave and worrying about looking cheap. But sometimes I want to go somewhere nicer and I want to have an enjoyable experience, but then the bill comes and I feel awkward and inept.
And in my experience, both as a customer and as a waiter, service in non-tipping countries is generally no better and no worse than in the United States.
I could be wrong, but i’m going to go out on a limb and suggest that communist East Berlin is possibly not the most reliable example upon which to base a generalized analysis of the culture of tipping versus not tipping.
I guess it’s possible that, in the places you went to, there was no owner or manager whose had an interest in making sure that customers got served and left happy, but i’m here to tell you that this usually isn’t the case.
It may surprise you to know this, but the owners and managers of bars and restaurants in non-tipping societies do not open their establishments as charity homes for slothful waitstaff. They expect to make money, and they know that they can do this by providing good food and good service. If you don’t pull your weight in a restaurant in Australia or the UK or wherever, it might not affect your take-home pay at the end of your shift, but you will soon find yourself without a job at all. The incentive to do a good job is not absent in non-tipping situations; it simply manifests itself in a slightly different way.
Again, comes down to personal experience, i guess. I don’t find servers here in the US any more friendly, on the whole, than anywhere else i’ve been. And, in cases where they are “friendly,” it is often the sort of cloying, smarmy, faux-friendliness that drive me (and most of my non-American friends) crazy.
I’m not even sure what “going the extra mile means,” in this context. If the server is polite and efficient and does his or her job, that’s all i need. I don’t need them to be my buddy, and i don’t need them falling over themselves to be obsequious. A good waiter is like a good sports official: the less you notice them, the better.
I agree, but I think that in many ways this is quite a non-American attitude.
In my experience—yours may vary—many Americans like the whole intrusive “is everything still ok here? let me just drop down to eye level to flirtatiously take your order” thing. It certainly gets bigger tips.
pdts
It wouldn’t work. Waitstaff are paid less than minimum wage, while the glorified fast food workers at a Starbucks are paid well above minimum wage - and they still expect to be tipped.