To be not looking forward to NYC holiday

[Kakamora]

Because of a post I’ve just seen about servers complaining they’ve had a tip that doesn’t reflect what they spent on food.

Yes I know that tips top up their wages but I want to take my mum on some pretty fancy dinners while we’re there and just because I spend $100 dollars which I’ve saved up my minimum wage money for, I don’t see why some server thinks that’s entitles he to a $20 tip because I’m spending a lot of money.

It is annoying me thinking I will have to save around an additional £150 for tip money. I always tip, but I don’t think waitresses here in the U.K. (which I am part time, think that spending £100 you know people have budgeted for warrants an expensive tip

A NYC minimum wage of $9 per hour would be a long way short of a living wage.

Yup, but the employer should be paying that wage or a higher one.
The employment contract is between the employer and the employee, not the diner and the employee.
Diners should not feel obliged to top up tightwad employers.

If the restaurant is charging $30 for a dish that contains $10 of ingredients
or $40 for a bottle of wine that is $15 in the store
they can pay their waiting staff more than $4 an hour

There are overheads beyond the price of the food and drinks that leave margins tight. Rent, utilities and insurance are all costly.

Ideally, the wage should be a living wage, not a minimum wage. However, in order to achieve even a minimum wage the prices on the menu would have to be much higher. This might have a dampening effect on the restaurant scene as a whole.

Restaurants, hotels and bars are part of the tourism and convention industry that generates a lot of tax income for NYC, which in turn pays for city services which the residents depend on. Allowing wait staff a chance to increase their income by dint of their own efforts and sharing out the tips with invisible staff results in the maintenance of what is, granted, an imperfect system, but it is not really clear what might replace it apart from making third level education free or far more affordable than it is now, and giving unions back the influence they once had.

$9 per hour is an insult to an adult, especially when the top 5% of earners make obscene amounts, and even the top 50% make so much more.

• Just to be clear, I am a big fan of unions and free or very low cost third level education. The US is rapidly turning into a banana republic thanks to the greed of the oligarchs who run it.

I wouldn’t be worrying so much about tipping.
I’d be really worried about the current exchange rate, everything will be extortionate.

mathanxiety
Funny that cities in other countries manage to have restaurants AND proper payroll for staff

when in Rome and all that

Talkin That's the thing. The restaurants do pay that IF tips don't pay enough for their wage to meet the minimum wage of $11 and change. So either way there is a minimum. Good waiters won't stick around getting $11 an hour. The bad ones move into a union job which pays $15/hr+. Restaurants that have to pay $11/hr to their waitstaff go out of business.

Had some terrible service in NYC. You’d think if their livelihood depended on it and it was their job to provide good service they’d manage it. It’s the main part of their job! I wonder if the fact they know they’ll get a tip
means they don’t make an effort. I’m out here for a few weeks so a general observation...

Whereas in Britain the the is proportional to how good the service is. Therefore more of an incentive for waiters?

It makes me cross that they provide terrible service then expect a 20% tip.

The problems around minimum wage and its impact on both workers and employers exist in every country.

Most other countries provide a safety net and welfare of some sort that can be drawn on even while working, and third level education that doesn't land you in debt for the rest of your life. The US does not. Maximising income even as a waiter makes it possible for all the little cogs in the restaurant business to whirl around smoothly and maybe come out in the black. In other countries the government enables restaurants to pay a wage that may or may not be a living wage by providing free childcare hours or tax credits or healthcare free at point of service.

Market driven wages are more efficient and result in higher wages than a minimum wage might in many cities.

mathsanxiety as mentioned upthread I don't have much expertise in this area, but I thought the US offered at least some kind of safety net to the working poor?

There's an article about it here: laborcenter.berkeley.edu/the-high-public-cost-of-low-wages/

"The report estimates that state and federal governments spend more than $150 billion a year on four key antipoverty programs used by working families: Medicaid, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, food stamps and the earned-income tax credit, which is specifically aimed at working families" according to the NY Times

Jeez how stingy are you to resent tipping! You obviously can't afford to holiday in the US, so stay home and get shitty service that UK restaurants are known for 🙄

but I thought the US offered at least some kind of safety net to the working poor?

It varies vastly by state and can be time-limited in many cases or have very low payment thresholds. The reality is that there really isn't much of a public safety net at all.

It varies vastly by state

Yes, I believe I read that too. Isn't it the case that who can be helped is federally mandated, but how much and for how long is down to the states?

Wow, some interesting attitudes here. We tip 10% ish in the U.K. and 15%-20% in the States. Never occurred to me not to really. We had 6 nights in a NYC suite so tipped on the last day for house keeping. I've recently discovered we should have done it daily. Hopefully we didn't offend too much.

Those programmes are for working families - there is very little available for struggling students or other single adults who do not live at home or who live at home but are over the age limit for food stamps (you age out at 19 in many states so even if you live at home your family may not be able to afford to feed you).

Young adults or hungry teenage boys get the thin end of the wedge. With food stamps, the same amount is paid out per child whether you are feeding an 8 year old or a 15 year old. Many a teenage boy flirts with gangs because fried chicken is so tempting.

mathanxiety
Market driven wages are more efficient and result in higher wages than a minimum wage might in many cities
Do you have evidence for that assertion ?

If restaurants that charge a $20 markup on a cheap bottle of wine refuse to guarantee their staff more than $4 an hour
I have a big problem with that

www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/working-papers/2016/adrm/carra-wp-2016-03.pdf

No matter how much the markup on a bottle of plonk might be an employee depending only on minimum wage is still going to go home with $9 per hour and the owner is going to pocket the rest of the profit, with no opportunity for the waiter to earn more via tips. For the hour spent waiting a particular table with a tab of $100 that generates a profit of $60, shall we say, the waiter gets $9 and the owner pockets $61. With tips, a waiter could take in $80 (assuming four tables for the hour) plus his base hourly pay. I think it's self evident that 20% of a given tab can often be far higher than $9 and that the waiter/restaurant-owner relationship is much more symbiotic and not as exploitative as some are arguing it is. Wait staff are not getting rich, obviously, as living expenses in NYC and other cities are very high and those who are students face education-related expenses. But some can break even or even come out a little ahead, which they could never do if they relied on minimum wage.

Only about 1% of American workers are paid the federal minimum wage. Obviously there are many reasons why millions of workers are paid more than this, but even teenage babysitters in many places can earn $10 per hour because that is the going rate, and there are places where the rate is much higher.

The link is a paper that discusses the effect of raising the tipped minimum wage. The highest it can go is about $4.50 before there is a negative effect. The negatives include tips going down and employment in the sector being reduced. While not specifically a discussion of market driven wages but instead a discussion of minimum wage, I think inferences can be drawn.

Lived there for many years. If I had witnessed that waiter chasing and harassing someone for the lack of tip I'd not tip a all because that'd have screwed my experience.