If you work in the food service industry and depend on tips to make ends meet, you probably don’t need to be told how important tips are and how low a server’s “base” pay is. If this is the case, you probably know both of these facts already.
Even so, there are still some people who think tipping is never necessary or who don’t agree that tips should be based on a percentage of the total price. And yes, it does seem silly that tips are even suggested in many situations, like when you order your own food at a Shake Shack using a self-service kiosk. It seems like a waste of time to even suggest that people leave tips in these situations.
But when it comes to “old school” service jobs like bartending and waiting tables, it’s hard to find a reason not to tip well. Aaliyah Cortez (@f.aa.ded), who works as a bartender, showed why this is true when she posted a video of one of her paychecks online. In the video, Aaliyah shows a check she got for the money she left in tips.
The video shows part of her paycheck, which shows that she was paid $2.13 per hour for a total of 70.80 hours of work. This is obviously her regular hourly wage before tips, which is how she gets the money she needs to live on. Even though the hourly wage from the Great Depression is already sad, the deductions from her pay make the total amount even more shockingly low.
Aaliyah shows that after Medicare, Social Security, and Federal Taxes were taken out of her pay, she was only left with $9.28 for a little less than 71 hours of work.
Now, it’s hard to imagine why anyone would keep working at a job that pays so little, so let’s hope that Aaliyah makes a good amount of money as a bartender from tips. Depending on where her bar is and who goes there, she could be doing quite well financially.
On the other hand, other TikTok users’ responses to her post were all over the place in the comments section. Some people said that Aaliyah’s message was still true and told everyone to keep tipping their servers. On the other hand, some people said that it is not the customer’s job to help pay the employees of a business.
Many people brought up the fact that the United States is one of the few countries in the world that forces people who work in the food service industry to live mostly off of tips.
This is why the US should be like EVERY other developed nation and not have a tip culture. Businesses should pay your wages. Tips shouldn’t be a thing.
People from other countries said they had never seen a pay system like this before, and they were thankful that the people who served them got enough money to live on:
we don’t this problem in Australia, because we’re actually developed
I’ve never been so glad to be Australian
People also thought that businesses, not customers, should be held accountable for the situation. Many of these people said that workers should look for other jobs if they don’t want to be forced to work in a system where they have to wait and see if they’ll get enough tips in a given week.
Aaliyah said in the comments that she likes her job as a bartender. She also posted a picture of her paycheck to encourage people to tip their servers. She told them that if people don’t tip, servers won’t be able to make enough money to take care of themselves and their families.
In the comments, more servers said that because of this system, they end up making more money than people who get paid a salary.
I’m a waitress & my bfs the cook.. I bring more home in tips than he does on his paycheck. Either ur a bad server or ur not working at the right place.
What do you think about what’s going on? Should there be an end to tipping in restaurants in the United States, and instead, businesses should be required to pay servers a set hourly wage so that servers always know what they can expect to earn? Let us know in the comments section below.
