Is It Time We All Stop Tipping? It’s Absolutely Out Of Control!

“Why tip someone for a job I’m capable of doing myself? I can deliver food, I can drive a taxi, I can and do cut my own hair. I did, however, tip my urologist because I am unable to pulverize my own kidney stones.” — Dwight Shrute, “The Office”

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Let’s start at the beginning: Forcing customers to tip service employees is simply a way businesses fob off paying their employees a decent wage.

In case you don’t know this, service employees — waiters, waitresses, casino workers, anyone who works for tips — get paid far less than regular workers. In Virginia, for instance, the minimum wage is $12 per hour. However, businesses can pay their tipped employees as low as $2.13. Some companies can simply declare that their employees are state-employed. “tipped employees.”

Herein lies the problem. Say you order a large cappuccino with extra foam — at an insane price of $4.75 — at your local coffee shop. You have multiple tips options when you insert your credit card into the reader.

Now, why? It’s the barista’s job to make your coffee, and that’s literally all they’re doing. They’re not tending to you as a server for an hour or, say, pulverizing your kidney stones.

And they’re not just looking for two bits. Some options top out at 30% (but of course, there’s a way to create a custom tip, so if you want to go to 100%, knock yourself out).

“Suddenly, these screens are at every establishment we encounter. They’re popping up online as well for online orders. And I fear that there is no end,” etiquette expert Thomas Farley Telled The Associated Press, last week.

Then there’s your local burger joint, the place that churns out patties all day long. The cashier will take your order and offer you a tip. The cashier will take your order. The cooks also did their job, making your burger. Why would you tip them?

The digital tipping experience is very different from the tip jar where you can drop a few bucks. It forces the cold-hearted buyer into declaring. “no tip for you.” That’s weird because everyone now knows you didn’t tip — including the guy cooking your burger.

It feels like extortion. Since you can’t see that burger guy, you gotta wonder if he’ll maybe drop your patty on the floor as punishment for not tipping. At one place I went to recently, I offered no tip, and my to-go order contained ice-cold fries — not luke-warm, ice-cold (I had to go in to get new ones, and then I felt compelled to give the burger slinger a couple of bucks).

But I’m a former waiter. We all know what it’s like to be in the weeds, and how difficult all those Karens can make. Even if the service is terrible, I’ll still tip 10% at a restaurant. Excellent service earns 25%

Nevertheless, I still think about my tipping every time. “Why don’t you just pay your workers a better wage? Why is it MY job to subsidize your low pay?” And sure, I get it: If you paid workers more, you’d likely charge more, and I might just go down the street to a place where a little burger doesn’t cost $10 (looking at you, Five Guys).

Don’t ask for tips.

Consumers have been hard hit by inflation of double-digits and skyrocketing prices all over the board. Some are starting to protest against tipping. As comedian Mitch Hedberg : “I bought a doughnut and they gave me a receipt for the doughnut. I don’t need a receipt for a doughnut, I’ll just give you the money then you give me the doughnut. End of transaction. We don’t need to bring ink and paper into this.”

And we don’t need to bring tipping into this, either. I was handed a doughnut by you!

However, the generosity of consumers has not diminished, particularly during the COVID epidemic. According to the AP, tipping at full-service restaurants increased by 25% in the third quarter 2022 while tips at counter-service or fast-food spots rose 16.7% compared with the same period in 2021.

There are many people who get frustrated by the incessant requests for tips.

“If you work for a company, it’s that company’s job to pay you for doing work for them,” Mike Janavey is a New York City-based footwear and clothing designer. “They’re not supposed to be juicing consumers that are already spending money there to pay their employees.”

Maybe if we — all at once — just stop tipping, employers would be forced to pay their workers more. Perhaps monkeys might fly out of my mouth.

The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Joseph Curl has covered politics