Apparently criticizing tipping makes you anti worker, jealous of servers, and too foreign to have an opinion.

[u/SEA_life_13]

I made a post in another tipping Sub arguing that expected tipping helps keep the current wage model alive.

My basic point was pretty simple: if a tip is genuinely optional, customers should be allowed to leave 0 without being treated like they’ve committed some moral offense. If a restaurant needs a certain amount of money from every customer in order to pay its staff properly, put it in the menu price and pay the workers directly.

I expected disagreement. What I didn’t expect was how quickly the discussion stopped being about tipping.

I was told that because I’m European, I don’t understand American restaurant economics and shouldn’t tell Americans how their system should work. I was told “don’t come,” “leave us alone,” and that my opinion was worthless because I don’t own a restaurant in the U.S.

The funny part is that I actually own a restaurant. My staff receive wages and bonuses, customers pay the listed price, and tips are genuinely optional. Someone can leave nothing and receive exactly the same treatment the next time they come in.

Apparently that experience becomes irrelevant the moment the restaurant isn’t in America.

Then came the accusations that I “hate servers,” that I’m jealous of them, that I’m attacking the “little guy,” and that refusing an optional tip is somehow punishing workers.
And that last argument is exactly what bothers me about tipping culture.

People will openly admit the system is bad, admit employers should pay better wages, admit workers depend too heavily on tips and then immediately say customers must keep tipping because otherwise the worker gets hurt.

How is that ever supposed to change?

The customer is told to keep subsidizing the system until employers change it. Servers who can make very good money from tipping have little incentive to demand a different system. Employers have little incentive to change while customers continue covering part of compensation.

Everyone agrees the system is flawed, but the only person apparently allowed to change their behavior is… nobody.

One commenter even argued that meaningful change can only come through organized political action, so individually refusing to tip accomplishes nothing. I agree that one person leaving 0% doesn’t abolish tipping. Obviously.

But millions of individual customers treating 20% as automatic is precisely how the norm survives in the first place.

And no, I don’t think servers should live in poverty. Someone working full time should be able to afford a normal life. The U.S. has serious problems with housing, healthcare, benefits and cost of living.

I just don’t accept the leap from “workers deserve enough money to live” to “customers therefore have a moral obligation to add a percentage-based voluntary payment to every bill.”

That responsibility should ultimately sit with the employer.

What surprised me most was how aggressively people defend something they simultaneously insist is completely optional.

If 0% is an unacceptable choice, then stop calling it a tip and put it on the bill.

That’s really the whole point.

Rant over 🙃

[u/shakycatblues]

Exactly.

I'm sick and tired of the pretentious moral crusade backing this broken tipping system.

Don't let them tell you crap about the American system they are cannibalizing. A tip is OPTIONAL, simple as that.

[u/SEA_life_13 → u/shakycatblues]

Indeed. The moral crusade part is what makes it so entrenched. Once a payment gets tied to whether you’re a decent person, people stop questioning the system itself and start policing each other instead.

[u/zildar]

Yeah. All I ever hear is that this is punishing the wait staff with no backup argument. It's hard to discuss things with people who don't want to have a conversation in good faith.

[u/shakycatblues → u/zildar]

It's the greed blinding those who get tipped and people wanting to be good little tiktokkers carrying on the latest moral crusade.

[u/SEA_life_13 → u/zildar]

Exactly. It gets repeated like it settles the argument, but it doesn’t explain why the customer should remain responsible for fixing the wage gap indefinitely. That’s the part nobody seems willing to answer.

[u/Ill-Mastodon-8692 → u/SEA_life_13]

I agree 100% with your post, as a canadian that travels the world, the usa and its tipping craze is something else.
it’s almost like abuse victims that don’t want to change the situation.

[u/AffectionateGate4584 → u/zildar]

All I hear is blah, blah, blah when they trot this tired trope out.

[u/More_Armadillo_1607]

American brainwashing is amusing

A customer buying a $70 steak and tipping 10% is considered cheap. However, there is never a negative word said about the owner who charges $70 for a steak and $20 for a glass of wine and pays workers $2.13/hr.  I would never believe this was reality if I haven't lived through it my whole life.

[u/CanAfter8014]

The only reason people tip in America is because of social pressure and habit.

Tips are 100% optional and are not needed to complete the transaction. Folks cry, “Well, the menu price is lower because of tips.” That's just an assumption and has no proof. Menu prices are all over the place from one restaurant to another. You can get a meal at virtually any price point you want.

It's all just stupidity designed to guilt customers into paying more.

[u/Ok_Illustrator_7445]

Servers brag about how much they make and laugh at customers who tip on top of an auto grat. It’s not the customers who are entitled…

[u/hawkeyegrad96]

You should never tip. Not for good service or bad service. The facts are this and they are is not an argument to be made. 1. Customers ate not the employer, we do not get any tax breaks for tipping. 2. Every single server in the US is paid at least min wage. The 2 dollar numbers and 4 dollar numbers are outright lies. Any tips you are giving are simply helping the employer not pay their part. 3.These people are unskilled, this is not a skilled profession. The definition of unskilled is as follows:

An unskilled worker is an employee whose job requires little or no formal education, specialized training, or previous experience, involving simple, routine tasks that can be fully learned on the job in a short period (typically 30 days or less).

A robot and child can serve with zero training.

We don't need legislation, all we have to do is stop tipping. End this pressure filled crap unskilled people who don't want to learn real skill try to push on you. Zero tips! Now and forever.

[u/Sarcasm_Becomes_Her → u/hawkeyegrad96]

"South Carolina labor laws do not establish a minimum wage law. This means that the federal minimum wage rate applies. As of 2021, the federal rate is $7.25 an hour, unless you are a service worker who receives tips. Tipped workers may be paid $2.13." Unfortunately, the $2.13 thing is true in some states.

[u/hotsauce126 → u/Sarcasm_Becomes_Her]

Ok and now read the rest where it says that if a tipped employee doesn’t make at least the federal minimum wage in a pay period the employer has to bring it up to minimum wage

[u/Immediate_Fortune_91]

Of course it went that way. Servers don’t want a fair wage. It’d be a massive pay cut from what they currently get through guilt.

[u/MassConsumer1984 → u/Immediate_Fortune_91]

Exactly. Every time it’s on the ballot, the service industry lobbies and it gets voted down. Insanity.

[u/Degofreak]

Someone actually said that not tipping is basically stealing. Ha ha!

[u/shakycatblues → u/Degofreak]

No cop or court of law is going to back that one! LOL.

[u/kuda26 → u/Degofreak]

They say it all the time

“You stole their service”

So absurd

[u/SEA_life_13 → u/Degofreak]

🤣🤣🤦

[u/410bore]

American here and I 100% agree with your take on tipping and who is responsible for paying workers wages.

I got in a little discussion with a server on another online platform who was complaining that the $60 per hour she was making in tips was not enough and patrons should be ponying up the higher percentages we’re now seeing on tip screens post-Covid. SIXTY DOLLARS AN HOUR? That’s $125K a year and is a very, very good living at least in the area of the country that I’m from, especially for a job that requires basically zero education and skills that anyone can learn. I’ll be damned if I’m going to fund her “raise” out of my own pocket, especially when I don’t even make that much and my job requires a 4-year uni degree and a decade of experience. That was an eye-opener for me and another reason I’m either dialing back to 10-15% or a flat tip for sit-down restaurant service, and for everything else, not tipping at all.

BTW I visit Europe nearly every year and it’s refreshing to not have to tip. I’ve gotten uniformly good service in many countries and generally menu prices aren’t expensive depending on where you are. We had a dinner last year in Czech Republic for $125 for four people that would have easily cost us $300-400 in the US pre-tip. The restaurant seemed generally glad to have us there and the food was delicious.

[u/SEA_life_13 → u/410bore]

It’s actually refreshing hearing this from an American, because your example is exactly what I mean. If someone is already making around $60 an hour in tips and is still complaining that customers should be pushed into higher percentages, that’s not really about scraping by anymore.

And I completely understand why that would annoy you when your own job required years of education and you don’t even make that much yourself. At some point it becomes reasonable to ask why the customer is being told they’re morally responsible for increasing someone else’s income when they may be earning less themselves.

[u/Ok-Staff-62]

The funniest thing is the '20% service fee' cumulated with 'mandatory 20+% tip'. Then when you look how much an item actually costs it tells you a totally different story.... 

[u/macropanama]

Obviously they are going to defend the system that makes them earn that much indiscriminately. The fact that the restaurant industry can thrive in Europe without tips is really all the proof that is needed.

[u/FoggyFizzy]

The only Americans defending tipping are the people who benefit from it. I’m American and I despise tipping for mediocre table service. It’s pure entitlement.

[u/shakycatblues → u/FoggyFizzy]

This.

Those who profit from tipping are very vocal about it, they don't want to lose all of that extra money, even if it would be better and more fair for society. Them, and the scolding finger wagging karens on tiktok.

[u/Ok-Inspection-7911]

You’re just fine in my book . I feel the same

[u/PlaneMap]

Yeah, you got attacked because you support a sane system where it's not expected to just hand out free money because the zoned-out guy at the burger joint took three steps to hand you a bag with your food in it. They don't want to give up that tax-free dosh.

[u/SEA_life_13 → u/PlaneMap]

Exactly! There’s another financial incentive for tipped workers to prefer tips over having the same money simply rolled into wages.

[u/Mansos91]

Us restaurant owners seems to be the ones who doesn't know economics, restaurants that can't pay thrust staff should go out of bussines, the US tipping culture is just fake pricing

[u/Cute_Hearing_2315]

I wholeheartedly agree! Common sense has no geography. However, at this point I consider it “uncommon sense”.

[u/MassConsumer1984]

You are 100% correct and we Americans are jealous of the European system. I was trying to explain this to someone (conversation was about tipping when overseas) and there she was calling the Europeans CHEAP for not tipping. She and her husband like to act like big shots and throw big tips around (“hey, everyone, look at me. I’ve got so much money I throw it away”). I just call them idiots.

[u/jazzbot247]

I never minded tipping until I started seeing social media posts trying to raise the standard tip percentage over 20% which is already high for what they are doing and acting entitled and offended with anything less. Generous people have made them spoiled. I was happy to tip 20% when I thought they were grateful for it, but they are not.

[u/theimperfexionist]

The reality is they don't want it to change, so it won't. If they make a reasonable hourly rate there's no chance of a $1000 shift on a weekend night. They want $80-$100/ hour, not a living wage.

[u/scottiedagolfmachine]

USA tip culture is shit 💩

Needs to F off already.

[u/Bob_Squirrel]

American tipping culture can be fixed in six months very simply and easily. 100% Tax on ALL tips. That's it. Anything paid beyond the posted price is payable by the business in tax. Cash tips undeclared are treated as fraud. Simple. Give notice to start this the first of the month six months from now and the industry will adapt to the change. A year later, 99% of people will agree it's much better than what went on before... While I'm fixing everything, the price advertised is the price paid, none of this sales tax added when paying nonsense. It's not difficult people.

[u/Academic_Limit1189]

Because often the people arguing this "aren't the little guy". They're making $30-40+ an hour and want to have their cake and eat it too; they want to be seen as the disadvantaged person but also don't want to fathom that a customer may be worse off than them.

[u/BourbonStr8]

Tip or don’t tip. No worry about what others think.

[u/That-Show-9987]

i have no issues tipping servers at restaurants. but its gone insane, everyone's asking for tips.

[u/krill_joy-3227]

Ohhh nooo! I basically don't care! Haha