# What would it take for not tipping to become socially acceptable in North America? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 15, 2021, 11:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963 "2021-03-15T23:14:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/141 "2021-03-18T16:13:46Z")
They seem able to operate restaurants in dozens of countries where you don’t tip, or tip very little. It’s the damndest thing. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/142 "2021-03-18T16:14:03Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > The majority of restaurants split tips among the servers I don’t have any figures to cite on this, but I have worked in a few dozen restaurants. I have only worked in two where servers pooled their tips. And they all were holding back tips. They figured it was only fair to do so, since they knew that everyone else was. Those were actually two of the most miserable places that I worked at, now that I think about it. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/143 "2021-03-18T16:22:09Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > Is this true? My daughter’s first waitressing job split tips among servers and so she quit the job after a week. > [@k9bfriender](#): > > don’t have any figures to cite on this, but I have worked in a few dozen restaurants. I have only worked in two where servers pooled their tips. This may be limited by my experience. I’ve seen it in most chains around here. I guess for the small independent places it may be less common. I believe the chains do this because they will get held responsible for the reporting of tips. I don’t believe that in very many places all tips get reported, but local tax authorities will be checking up on them and they need to report reasonable numbers. ---
**Author:** ![TimothyNewsome](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7ba0ec/32.png) [@TimothyNewsome](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TimothyNewsome)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/144 "2021-03-18T16:40:20Z")
So at least 36 different, seperate restaurants? In the span of how many years? Frankly, that seems rather excessive, in any profession—In most of my local hangouts, the majority of my friends who are servers, bartenders or in management positions have 5, 10 or 15+ years at the same place. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/145 "2021-03-18T17:02:37Z")
I think we may be talking about slightly different things but if you have a cite for the idea that the US ( or any state ) Dept of Labor requires servers and restaurants to keep records of tips on an hourly basis , I’d love to see it. If on the other hand , you are talking about the requirement to pay full minimum for time spent assigned to doing untipped work (such as setting up or cleaning up while the restaurant is closed ) then I will acknowledge that I could have been clearer. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/146 "2021-03-18T17:12:45Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > I don’t believe that in very many places all tips get reported, but local tax authorities will be checking up on them and they need to report reasonable numbers. I’m sure that they know that tips aren’t being reported. As long as it’s not too excessive, they turn a blind eye to it. > [@TimothyNewsome](#): > > So at least 36 different, seperate restaurants? In the span of how many years? Yep. Though I suppose there were a couple that were different locations of the same chain. Over the course of 20 years, I had 43 jobs, with only 5 of those jobs being in something other than food service. Everything from fast food to high end dining. Sometimes I worked 2 or 3 at once, sometimes I only stayed at a place for a couple of weeks. Lots of people in food service move around, so by my mid 20’s, there wasn’t a restaurant in the area that I didn’t know at least someone that I had worked with before. It was fun to try different places, and I ended up being in high demand, as I often would fix a bunch of the problems that a restaurant had before moving on. Gained a lot of experience, got to meet a lot of people. Learned how to cook nearly anything in any style. I’ve been in my current “job” for 8 1/2 years now. Seems weird to me, actually. Prior to this, the longest I held a single job was a bit under 2 years, and that was pretty much just the one. And yes, tax time was a pain, I often had 6 to 8 w-2’s. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/147 "2021-03-18T17:14:33Z")
Why does the price have to be much higher because the restaurant owner is not going to reduce their margin? Sure, they could make the price much higher so as not to reduce the margin - I’m not questioning that they can. I’m questioning why they would **have** to raise the price by more than was necessary to keep the servers compensated the same . Why cant they take a lower margin while taking the same amount of money to the bank? I dont see what prevents that other than the owners own choice. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/148 "2021-03-18T17:20:35Z")
First, how do they know how much to increase the price of each item by to ensure they make enough money to pay the servers? Secondly, it’s basic economics, reducing the margin literally devalues the business. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/149 "2021-03-18T17:22:37Z")
No, they don’t keep such detailed records. I made no such claim. But yes, they are supposed to be paid MW for any hours they do not make up for it in tips. I worked at a place that got in a bunch of trouble about that. Having servers doing side work for a couple hours before and after the time that they had tables. How well it is enforced, in general, is probably not much at all, only in fairly blatant violations does it have any chance of being dealt with. If a server only makes $4 in tips in a particular hour, then the employer _should_ be making up the difference between that, plus their $2.13, and the local MW. In practice, I doubt that happens very often if ever. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/150 "2021-03-18T17:24:26Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I’m sure that they know that tips aren’t being reported. As long as it’s not too excessive, they turn a blind eye to it. The tax people know about it also. They know they can’t find out how much all the tips are. With the chains they have a lot more information to make estimates based on from the different locations and what they report, but for any one restaurant they aren’t going to try to crack down hard on tips as long as it looks reasonable. The income tax and the sales tax people do want to go after restaurant owners though, they know a lot of money never goes through the register and the rest of the staff is often getting paid in unreported cash. And even then they know they can’t get blood from a stone. ---
**Author:** ![doreen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/858c86/32.png) [@doreen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/doreen)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/151 "2021-03-18T17:36:07Z")
I agree with you about the side work before and after the hours they have tables - but if no one is required to keep any record that Betty was waiting tables from 4-10 and only got $2 in tips between 4-5, how would anyone know she should be paid direct minimum for that hour? Especially if Betty got a total of $60 in tips for that 6 hour shift. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/152 "2021-03-18T17:41:41Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > First, how do they know how much to increase the price of each item by to ensure they make enough money to pay the servers? The same way that they account for cook, dishwasher, utility, and management labor. It’s really not that hard to price out a menu in such a way to account for your costs. It’s just adding one more in. > [@TriPolar](#): > > Secondly, it’s basic economics, reducing the margin literally devalues the business. Are you talking about relative margin or absolute margin? Lots of people worry about food cost or the relative margin of a menu item. They think that they should mark up the food cost of each item by 3x and put it on the menu. But, there is a reason why lots of restaurants fail. Do you think that 33% food cost is better than 40% food cost? If so, can you tell me if you make more money off a steak dinner that you pay $8 and charge $20, or off a salad that you pay $4 and charge $12? The latter has a better “food cost”, the former actually makes you more money. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 6:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/153 "2021-03-18T18:13:36Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > The income tax … people would only go after the servers for underreporting the tips. Not the restaurant, the restaurant doesn’t keep those tips, so they are not getting undeclared income off of them. > [@TriPolar](#): > > the sales tax people In many or most states, certainly in Ohio, you are not taxed on dine in service, so the sales taxes would be irrelevant. > [@doreen](#): > > I agree with you about the side work before and after the hours they have tables - but if no one is required to keep any record that Betty was waiting tables from 4-10 and only got $2 in tips between 4-5, how would anyone know she should be paid direct minimum for that hour? I’m not sure if we are agreeing here or not. What _should_ happen is that both Betty and management are aware that she was underpaid for that hour, and make up for it. What does happen is that that doesn’t happen. Servers sometimes _do_ keep a log of the tips that they get per hour, specifically for this reason. But most don’t, because they are going to be fudging the numbers anyway. Some places I’ve been, a server may have $0 in sales the first hour, even though they had a couple tables. It’s just that those tables paid cash, and the server pocketed both the bill _and_ the tip. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/154 "2021-03-18T18:39:35Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > The same way that they account for cook, dishwasher, utility, and management labor. It’s really not that hard to price out a menu in such a way to account for your costs. It’s just adding one more in. Right. Adding more in than the tip amounts would be. They have to account for enough to bring their pay up to a decent wage, even for the times they aren’t even serving any food. They’ll keep raising prices until they aren’t losing enough money to go out of business tomorrow, and that will be more than 15-20%. The rest of your post makes no sense. Your costs go up when you pay your employees more for doing the same work. Any food cost factor has to be completed re-established based on the new higher operating costs. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/155 "2021-03-18T18:55:58Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > They have to account for enough to bring their pay up to a decent wage, even for the times they aren’t even serving any food. You are supposed to be paying them at least MW when they aren’t serving food anyway, so all you are saying here is that it would stop a method that some poorly run restaurants steal from their staff. > [@TriPolar](#): > > They’ll keep raising prices until they aren’t losing enough money to go out of business tomorrow, and that will be more than 15-20%. You keep asserting this, but I do not see why. Right now, the customer pays 15-20% more than the menu price in order for the servers to make a wage that makes them happy. That would be the _most_ that a restaurant would have to raise the prices by in order to match the same amount of pay for a server. In reality, they actually wouldn’t need to raise it by quite that much. > [@TriPolar](#): > > The rest of your post makes no sense. Your costs go up when you pay your employees more for doing the same work. Any food cost factor has to be completed re-established based on the new higher operating costs. I was asking you a question. Is it relative or absolute margins that you are talking about here? I then gave you an example of relative vs absolute margin. (Most of the time, an absolute margin is referred to as gross profit, if that helps.) If that question doesn’t make sense to you, then you will not be able to meaningfully understand or contribute to this matter. ---
**Author:** ![mordecaiB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mordecaib/32/7725_2.png) [@mordecaiB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mordecaiB)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/156 "2021-03-18T19:50:51Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > The point here is, if you have a bunch of cash tips that you _forgot_ to declare, then your official hourly wage may be less than MW, when in actuality, it was significantly higher. When does that happen? If any server repeatedly reported tips under the minimum wage they would quickly be out of a job. I know you didn’t mean it this way but that argument sounds a lot like the old “all servers cheat on their taxes, so why should I tip?” excuse. > [@TriPolar](#): > > The majority of restaurants split tips among the servers so they do not hold back tips. I think this is a minority of places, by far > [@RickJay](#): > > They seem able to operate restaurants in dozens of countries where you don’t tip, or tip very little. It’s the damndest thing What is the point of this post? We are not talking about dozens of countries, this is about North America. Hell, there are dozens of countries where servers are paid less per day than servers make in an hour here. Should we go to that method since dozens of countries do it? Countries are different and you know that. They do different things in different ways. Seriously, you know better. > [@TriPolar](#): > > They’ll keep raising prices until they aren’t losing enough money to go out of business tomorrow, and that will be more than 15-20%. If they want to go out of business, sure. This is the kind of thinking that I posted above. Wages go up $1. McDonalds will raise everything by a dollar. Burger - $1, fries - $1, Coke - $1, Apple Pie - $1. Now your dollar meal costs $5. That’s not the way pricing works. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 8:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/157 "2021-03-18T20:20:08Z")
This is just nuts. I’ve worked in retail finance for 30 years. When our costs go up 20 cents per item we only need to push retails up 20 cents. It’s called “maintaining penny profit” There’s a very slight wrinkle to this in that some costs might be tight to the dollar sales. Like credit card costs. But if you were buying something for $1.00 and selling it for $1.50, then the cost goes up to $1.20, you do not raise prices to $1.50, because almost none of your other costs changed. Canonical case is gas stations. When gas is wholesaling at $2.00 the retail is $2.25. It the wholesale goes to $4.00, you do not double your gross margin in dollars by raising retails to $4.50. You’d be out of business. You’d go up to $4.27. $2.00 to cover the increased cost of gas, $0.02 to cover the increased cost of credit/debit processing on the higher dollar sales. Your labor, rent, utilities, cleaning, safety inspections, repairs are pretty much independent of the wholesale price of gas. And your business will be worth the same. It will be worth less as a multiple of sales, but no one cares about that except some VERY lazy investment analyst. ---
**Author:** ![Oredigger77](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/oredigger77/32/3181_2.png) [@Oredigger77](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oredigger77)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/158 "2021-03-18T21:51:31Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > You keep asserting this, but I do not see why. Right now, the customer pays 15-20% more than the menu price in order for the servers to make a wage that makes them happy. That would be the _most_ that a restaurant would have to raise the prices by in order to match the same amount of pay for a server. In reality, they actually wouldn’t need to raise it by quite that much. I don’t get this. Currently, the server is getting 20% over the final price on the bill including taxes. If the server is going to maintain that take home your would need to raise prices by the same 20% which would be more than the 20% cost the customer was previously paying since it now includes the original tax and then the whole amount get taxed again. Then in order for the server to take home the same amount you would also have to cover the employment taxes on that money that we not paid before. It seems that 20% would be a minimum increase and it would actually be closer to 23 or 25%. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/159 "2021-03-18T22:10:55Z")
Employment taxes not paid before? You mean the server was getting untaxed income by under reporting income? Tip income and wage income are both subject to the same taxes as far as I know. It’s not just the $2.13 an hour that gets taxes (employer and employee side) it’s the reported tips plus the 2.13 an hour. So unless they were cheating on their taxes… And yes, if the tips are 20% of the total after tax the increase would need to be 5-10% more than the tips. That would mean an increase of 21%-22% in the price. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2021, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963/160 "2021-03-18T22:21:09Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > (People who are scared of embarrassment or the mythical spit in the food, must also be fickle enough to go back to a place with lousy service deserving of no tip.) Nonsense. Don’t be absurd. I consider tipping to be extortion under threat, and I’ve also I’ve blacklisted restaurants that treated me like shit. These two things are not incompatible - especially since nobody who’s given it a moments thought thinks that the tipping system is built to accurately rate and reward service. And I’ve had service deserving of a tip maybe twice in my life. I don’t consider “carrying my food to my table”, “keeping my water glass full”, and “being reasonably polite and helpful” to be going above and beyond; I consider them to literally be the job. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-would-it-take-for-not-tipping-to-become-socially-acceptable-in-north-america/937963.md?page=9)