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Welcome back Bonz, but I do not find it strange that your presence being requested in the Orgy thread and then you showing up, like it was the quacking Bonzai Bat Signal.
Post by Black Dynamite on Sept 5, 2013 14:19:00 GMT -5
Any thoughts on this? There are a few perspectives I'd like to hear from on this subject...
It was the coat check tips that did it, back when I was working for a restaurant company and became friendly with a woman who staffed one of our hostess stations. It felt strange and demeaning to go from chatting about our weekend plans one minute to pressing a couple of sweaty bills into her hand in exchange for my coat the next. But to abstain would be even worse — it would mean neglecting my contribution to a pool of money that I knew comprised her income. I get the feeling she wasn't too keen on the power dynamics, either.
The friendships I've formed with restaurant employees over the years have made me think seriously about why hospitality workers are singled out among America's professionals to endure a pass-the-hat system of compensation. Why should a server's pay depend upon the generosity — not to mention dubious arithmetic skills — of people like me?
So I was thrilled to hear that New York City's Sushi Yasuda recently decided to eliminate tipping altogether. Including gratuity for parties of six or more has already become relatively commonplace; in a few restaurants, like Thomas Keller's Per Se and The French Laundry, it's automatically added onto all checks. But Yasuda has gone one step further, dispensing with service as a separate line item — and implicitly, an "extra" — and folding it into their prices as a cost of doing business, along with the rent, and electricity, and ingredients.
If I had my way, we'd take this idea to its logical conclusion and get rid of the practice of tipping altogether. Just outlaw it. Here’s why:
1. People don’t even understand what a tip is
If you are of the belief that a tip is an optional kindness you’re doing for your server, you might be surprised to hear that you are not in France. Here in America, the practice is voluntary only in the legal sense of the word. You are not technically stealing if you don't tip the customary 15 to 20 percent, but that’s probably the best that can be said of you. The tip you pay is a sort of wage: federal law allows tips to be used to make up the difference between a server's salary and minimum wage, meaning they can make as little as $2 to $3 per hour from their restaurant employer. Tips are absolutely depended upon to make up the shortfall.
When you leave a bad tip, you are docking a person's wages. This may either be because you're confused about what's expected or because you're an a-hole, and you really believe that your sea bass arriving lukewarm is justly punishable by making it a little harder for the guy who brought it to you to pay his rent.
2. Doctors don’t live on tips. Nor do flight attendants.
Tip confusion is understandable, because it's not the way we choose to compensate most of our other people-facing professions. Imagine if when you went to the doctor, you decided how much he got paid based on how happy you were with the diagnosis; or if actors and musicians were paid discretionary sums by the audience, post-performance. Even within the context of the restaurant, some roles receive salaries and others rely on tips. Why do I tip the bartender who made my Manhattan, but not the line cook who grilled the excellent steak I'm eating with it? It’s completely arbitrary. Servers, whose job demands are not fundamentally different than that of hard-working office assistants, or hotel concierges, or spin instructors, or flight attendants, should be paid the competitive wage for what they do and how well they do it, and that cost should be factored into menu prices.
3. The percentage basis makes no sense
Did a server work less because I ordered a $40 bottle of wine than if I had ordered a $400 one? Should I feel a little bit bad when I'm a party of three on a table for four, as the waiter is getting stiffed on 25 percent of his or her optimal tip? Is it less hard to work at a roadside diner than Le Bernardin, where the check averages are approximately ten times higher? (Although that one isn't entirely fair; a place like Le Bernardin is dividing the tip among a much larger staff).
4. Better service doesn't actually beget better tips
Diners love the power to bestow or withhold financial reward at their whim; servers, in turn, seem to be motivated by the idea that really excellent service could be rewarded by a monster gratuity. The trouble is, that's not actually how things pan out in practice. Michael Lynn, a professor at Cornell's School of Hotel Administration, has spent his career researching tipping behaviors, and found that perceived service quality only accounts for two percent of the variation between tips. Two percent! It's probably not even enough to be picked up on by the server, much less cause a significant change in behavior.
5. It perpetuates racism and sexism
Lynn's research also shows that tip amounts are affected by racial and gender discrimination. Female servers get larger tips than male servers; sexy women earn more than frumpy ones; white servers, more money than their black counterparts — regardless of what the perceived quality of service is. The system works the other way, too. Black diners tip less on average than do white diners, and research shows that servers provide black diners with inferior service as a result. The tipping system catches us all in a regressive cesspool of our own worst prejudices.
6. Smart people have been trying to end the tipping practice for a century
Backlashes against the tipping practice are not new. There was an anti-tipping movement at the beginning of the 20th century amongst Americans who saw it as an aristocratic holdover contrary to the country's democratic ideals. Between 1909 and 1915 six states passed anti-tipping laws, all of which were repealed by the mid-1920's as unenforceable or potentially unconstitutional. Samuel Gompers, who founded the AFL, was one political figure notably outspoken against tipping as promoting detrimental class distinctions.
But despite all this, the country as a whole has been loath to abandon the tipping convention. If knowing all of the above, you still balk at the idea of a service charge being rolled into the cost of your meal, maybe you should ask yourself why this is. Are you unwilling to participate in what a restaurant judges to be the fair, market-rate compensation for its employees? Do you think that you are a pawn in a nefarious plot by management to grossly over-reward servers, those men and women who are on their feet for eight hours, ferrying your drinks and foods to and fro? Do you believe that you are in a better position than the restaurant manager to motivate and evaluate his or her staff and make the complicated decisions about compensation and employment?
If yes, can I march into your office and adjust your pay depending on how well you do in our meeting? Or — more accurately — depending on your skin color, your breast size, or your age? Well, of course not, is the answer to that one. Because that would be barbaric.
I copied this from another site, and work wouldn't let me use the link, but it's from esquire.com I believe.
I agree completely but it wont happen as long as their are business owners. The act of tipping takes the weight off of management for salary increases for employees so that they cannot be put to blame when the tips are bad, they just attribute it to the employee providing bad service. Hence no employee can go ask for a raise on the basis of tips being bad because bosses will spin that to "well you must not be doing your job properly", leaving employees to judge customers as soon as they walk in the door as big or little tippers and not concentrate on client needs and service. Vicious cycle going on in the service system and eliminating tipping would help solve these issues. That way, customers would know exactly what they will be paying at the end of the meal and what they are paying for. It will also set the bar for service and encourage workers to not work for a tip (aka a % of their pay), but for their job (100% of their pay) because unsatisfied clients will be more mindfull of what they are required to pay for rather then judging the scale of service. Also it will encourage customers to complain directly to management (another reason tipping benefits management)instead of just dropping a $2 tip and never coming back.
Post by crazykittensmile on Sept 5, 2013 14:47:56 GMT -5
It sounds great, but I also don't know if I trust that restaurant owners will compensate their employees well enough. I fear prices being raised without that amount being translated directly into decent wages, especially with larger chains, they'll just see it as an opportunity to cushion their bottom line a bit.
Post by chicojuarz on Sept 5, 2013 15:35:34 GMT -5
Here the restaurant/bar industry is very heavily a cash only, under the table business. Knowing a lot of people either in the industry or that own in the industry I can say they often have a second set of books, most employees are off the record as well. It's very common for a lot of the places to not even pay a base wage and have positions be tips only work.
It could be just where I live but it's an industry the thrives on taking advantage of undocumented workers. At the same time many of those workers at least can make an ok enough living that they aren't going without or working 16 hour days 7 days a week.
Ending the process of tipping here would I think almost have to be coupled with immigration reform. The impact if all employees had to fill out I-9s would be insane.
Post by heyyitskait on Sept 5, 2013 20:42:54 GMT -5
Today was my first day of culinary school. According to my food prep teacher, Bobby Flay scarfs down an obscene amount of corn, Emeril is a huge sexist jag, and Gordon Ramsay is "a real cupcake."
And I may do an internship at the Kentucky Derby next year.
Today was my first day of culinary school. According to my food prep teacher, Bobby Flay scarfs down an obscene amount of corn, Emeril is a huge sexist jag, and Gordon Ramsay is "a real cupcake."
At least two of those three are correct. You should ask about ol' Orange Crocs, Batali. He's a real sweetheart.
Good luck with culinary school, it's something I've always wanted to do. Maybe when the kids are gone.
Post by itrainmonkeys on Sept 5, 2013 21:48:09 GMT -5
Somebody please tell me this is just a joke....it has to be: In an extreme effort to stamp out unfriendly competition, a youth soccer group in Midlake, Ontario, is eliminating soccer balls from their games and forcing kids to pretend they’re kicking a ball around.
You're just too young to grasp how stylin' I really was. All the boys wanted to do me when I was 5. Actually the girls did too. My haircut was confusing.
We're all a mess of paradoxes. Believing in things we know can't be true. We walk around carrying feelings too complicated and contradictory to express. But when it all becomes too big, and words aren't enough to help get it all out, there's always music.
Post by Black Dynamite on Sept 6, 2013 12:58:25 GMT -5
I've been thinking about investing lately, and would like to get started. I've been doing some light reading to get my feet under me, but I was wondering if any of you have advice for a young guy with minimal cheese. Cheese is accepted lingo in the stock game, isn't it?
Welcome back Bonz, but I do not find it strange that your presence being requested in the Orgy thread and then you showing up, like it was the quacking Bonzai Bat Signal.
I've been thinking about investing lately, and would like to get started. I've been doing some light reading to get my feet under me, but I was wondering if any of you have advice for a young guy with minimal cheese. Cheese is accepted lingo in the stock game, isn't it?
The best investments are boring (bonds), the funnest investments are flimsy (options) and the majority of investments are proverbial coin tosses (stocks).
If you want to put a chunk of money aside, have it grow incrementally over a long period of time and have the return guaranteed? Buy bonds.
If you want to bet for or against a certain stock? Buy puts/calls.
If you want to just ride the wave buy stocks and hope they go up.
I have an ETF portfolio that does well for me. An ETF is essentially buying an entire market, not a stock. If a market performs well, you do better (you can also take out put/call options on an ETF stock).
It really depends on what you want to do, if you're just futzing around for the hell of it, if you're planning your retirement fund, etc.
Welcome back Bonz, but I do not find it strange that your presence being requested in the Orgy thread and then you showing up, like it was the quacking Bonzai Bat Signal.
I've been thinking about investing lately, and would like to get started. I've been doing some light reading to get my feet under me, but I was wondering if any of you have advice for a young guy with minimal cheese. Cheese is accepted lingo in the stock game, isn't it?
Rich Dad, Poor Dad is a decent place to start IIRC. a good financial advisor would probably recommend splitting money between moderate and high risk mutual funds since you're young. if you can leave your money in for a good while you can see some fairly sizable returns. if you're employed by a company that offers a 401(k) or 403(b), invest the max that the company will match, it's free money.
the stock market can be lucrative if you either follow business trends religiously or play it as a long game. don't invest anything you can't afford to lose. good luck!
Somebody please tell me this is just a joke....it has to be: In an extreme effort to stamp out unfriendly competition, a youth soccer group in Midlake, Ontario, is eliminating soccer balls from their games and forcing kids to pretend they’re kicking a ball around.
Post by Roo'adelphia on Sept 6, 2013 13:40:17 GMT -5
My gramps always bought us bonds as a kid. Like instead of getting cash or toys for our birthday we got $100 in 12 years. It always was like "thanks grampa..." as a kid but as I got older I monitored them growing. Then I found out all the grandkids got stock in PECO (PA electric) that would take the profits each year and roll it into more shares. It was fun as a kid monitoring my money and interest and seeing how the system works and my money grew. And in collage those bonds really added up to a lifesaver in some situations. Turns out those bonds were totally a great idea gpop. You the man.
Somebody please tell me this is just a joke....it has to be: In an extreme effort to stamp out unfriendly competition, a youth soccer group in Midlake, Ontario, is eliminating soccer balls from their games and forcing kids to pretend they’re kicking a ball around.
We're all a mess of paradoxes. Believing in things we know can't be true. We walk around carrying feelings too complicated and contradictory to express. But when it all becomes too big, and words aren't enough to help get it all out, there's always music.