'I'm not gonna f*cking tip you when all you're doing is taking a cup and handing it to somebody'

[Omaha Steve]

'Don't downplay baristas, it’s a very high stress job.'

By Braden Bjella Posted on Jan 28, 2023

Tipping culture remains a heated topic of debate on TikTok. Numerous users have gone viral after sharing their stances on tipping, with many stating their belief that, though they want to support workers, the amount of places customers are expected to tip is “getting out of hand.”

Users have told stories about being asked for a tip on pick-up orders, being denied service due to not tipping in the past, and even their belief that default tipping options on service terminals are unreasonably high.

Nowhere is this discussion fiercer than at Starbucks. Recently, Starbucks rolled out the ability for customers to tip baristas using their credit cards. While many have enjoyed this service for in-store orders, the system was also set up for the drive-thru, leading to numerous customers debating whether they truly need to tip in this situation.

Now, another user has gone viral for sharing their perspective on drive-thru tipping. In a video with over 644,000 views as of Saturday, TikTok user Meghan (@meghanelinor) says she’s against drive-thru tipping.

FULL story: https://www.dailydot.com/irl/worker-calls-out-starbucks-drive-thru-tipping/

[doc03]

1. I bribed my bicycle mechanic $20 to put my bike ahead of the line one day last summer, nt

[doc03]

2. Starbucks workers deserve a tip. They work non stop all day they have a timer at the drive through

counting how many seconds they take for each order. Looks like stressful job.

[delisen]

12. Are you willing to help the workers form a union

and get rid of the timer ?

For me the issue is we have billionaires preserving and making worse the income gap and inequality of income and the rest of us commiserate with the workers by tipping. So the big problem never gets solved. In fact income distribution getS more skewed.

I don’t know the answer. I don’t use drive thrus and am decreasing use of fast food joints. Dropping out seems to be improving my life but is hardly the answer for most people.

[doc03]

13. Being a lifelong union member, I support unions. It is up them to vote

to unionize. I have asked a couple of them how they feel about Starbucks having a union they said no.
They make a fairly good wage and have benefits. But what is a good wage here in Ohio is not a very good wage in
San Francisco or New York I am sure.

[Sancho]

3. I'm going to tip...whether others do or not...even for simple service

Why?

My own experience. My wife and I are older now, and have a good life. She just retired after 41 years of teaching, and I'm still going.

At any rate, we both lost parents early - and we both worked our way through college degrees. As teachers, we also had additional part time jobs on occasion when things were tough. You name it, we probably did it. I remember those days clearly, and how I appreciated every dollar.

I tip for service: valet, dog grooming, waiters and waitresses, hair cuts, delivery, cleaning, helping with the suitcase, etc., etc.

Yes, some are better employees than others, but in general people deserve higher wages than they get (at least in the US). The vast majority of employees are working hard, so no matter their circumstances, I'll tip because someone gave me tips that made my day years ago.

[ggma]

11. Ex Waitress here.

At one point I was working at a cafe in the morning and a bar at night.

Tips make the difference between bologna-hot dogs-hamburger meat-steak. We ate a lot of pot food and casseroles to stretch the meat. I will never forget. Hope that didn't sound aggressive, just feel strongly about it 🙂.

gg

[in2herbs]

4. Target home delivery allows tipping of the delivery person via credit card and Target

states on their website that all of the tip $$$ goes to the delivery person. I use this service quite often and always liberally tip the delivery person.

[AZSkiffyGeek]

5. Apparently that Tiktoker has never actually been to Starbucks

They've had tip jars out since I first visited one 30 years ago. Apparently doesn't know how to hit "no tip" on the screen either.

[vercetti2021]

6. I work at a local coffee shop

We always have a jar out in front. I don't ask or want tips. I'm just nice and usually they tip. Normally I'll give them a few extra things of whipped cream if they tip. I'm just nice like that.

[delisen]

7. U.S. Tipping is Way to Preserve Inequality of Income

Howard Schultz is happy with the pressure on customers to extend tipping I am sure. He is a billionaire and could well afford to press Starbucks to increase worker salaries and minimize tipping.

I think it is great when people wan to give to others. I don’t think tipping in businesses that can afford living wages but refuse to pay that wage is a virtuous act however. If the tippers are willing to send Schultz and the Starbucks CEO a letter demanding they pay generous wages each time they tip for being handed a cup we may be able to get on the path to a just and equal society.

I do not patronize Starbucks. I find it unaffordable. Does it support unionization of workers?

[Fiendish Thingy]

8. My son worked as a barista for years

I don’t drink coffee, and rarely venture into a coffee shop except when we’re travelling and need to make a pit stop. But when I do, I tip, because I know how hard they work.

[3Hotdogs]

9. If they'd pay a decent wage in the first place, tips wouldn't be necessary.

If you can't afford to pay a decent wage, you shouldn't hire people.

[appalachiablue]

14. +1. Herman Cain, Godfather's Pizza CEO, NRA Pres., Enduring Lobbying Triumph:

Herman Cain’s Enduring Lobbying Triumph. It's kept restaurant workers poor for decades. Mother Jones, 7.30.20.

Herman Cain, who died this week of COVID-19, lived quite a life: He was a fast-food magnate, a zealously anti–immigrant presidential candidate, a staunch supporter of Donald Trump to the very end, and more.

But his accomplishment with the most lasting impact happened during his days as the No. 1 lobbyist for the restaurant industry. During the 1990s, as president of the National Restaurant Association—an outfit representing mainly chain restaurants—Cain transformed the NRA “from a sleepy little trade association to earning a spot in Forbes magazine’s 1997 Survey of Washington’s 25 most powerful pressure groups, coming [in] at number 24,” as labor reporter Mike Elk put it in a 2011 piece. Cain earned his stripes as an ace lobbyist in 1994, when he emerged as a key cog in the successful corporate campaign to kibosh President Bill Clinton’s push to reform the healthcare system.

In 1996, Cain won his greatest triumph as a lobbyist. In a 2016 piece on the racist history of tipping, my colleague Maddie Oatman explained:

America’s first minimum-wage law, passed by Congress in 1938, allowed states to set a lower wage for tipped workers, but it wasn’t until the ’60s that labor advocates persuaded Congress to adopt a federal tipped minimum wage that increased in tandem with the regular minimum wage. In 1996, former Godfather’s Pizza CEO Herman Cain, who was then head of the National Restaurant Association, helped convince a Republican-led Congress to decouple the two wages. The tipped minimum has been stuck at $2.13 ever since.

Restaurant employers were supposed to help servers earn tips to make up the difference between this tipped minimum wage and the regular minimum wage. But the result was by and large a disaster for restaurant servers.
According to the Economic Policy Institute, in 1996, the tipped minimum was half the regular minimum wage; by 2014, it was “equal to a record low 29.4 % of the regular federal minimum wage of $7.25,” where it remains today. Around 2/3rds of workers making the tipped minimum are women, EPI reports.

Forcing women to rely on the whims of customers for the bulk of their livelihoods exposes them to sexual harassment: “Tipped workers have a median wage (including tips) of $10.22, compared with $16.48 for all workers.
While the poverty rate of non-tipped workers is 6.5%, tipped workers have a poverty rate of 12.8%.” Tipped workers rely on food stamps at a rate twice that of the general population. Around 2/3rds of workers making the tipped minimum are women...https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/07/herman-cains-enduring-lobbying-triumph/

[MichMan]

10. People routinely tip some low wage occupations and not others that earn similar wages

I never hear of anyone tipping self serve gas station attendants, fast food workers, grocery or retail clerks, for just a few examples. Why not tip them 15 % to supplement their low wages too ? They have similar wages to those in other jobs who are tipped frequently by customers. I worked as a minimum wage self serve gas station attendant for a little while many years ago; no one ever offered any tips.

I also worked as a bus boy at a restaurant while in college many years ago as well. The waitresses openly bragged in front of me about making over $100 a night in tips, while I made a total of $15 for the entire night at minimum wage. Once, one of them gave me a whole dollar.

It is pretty obvious that younger waitresses with pretty faces and more prominent "assets" made a lot more in tips than the others. It takes the same amount of work to serve someone a $10 burger, as it is a $50 lobster, yet tips are based on the size of the check.

I hope one day the entire practice is abolished as it is patently unfair.

[3Hotdogs]

15. Adam Smith explained it better. IF nobody tipped, wages would be $2.15 per hour.

Workers would bail.

Employers would have to raise wages or do the work themselves or fold the tent.

[MichMan]

17. By law, employers are required to make up the difference between the tipped wage and minimum wage

If adequate tips are not given

[PJMcK]

16. My simple solution

Make your own coffee at home. It’s less expensive and better tasting.

Tip yourself accordingly.

[LiberalFighter]

18. Are they paid actual minimum wage or what restaurant waiters/waitresses are paid?