Are you a good tipper?

[dong20]

tipping is optional, but they shouldn't make the consumer feel pressured into paying it (as everyone seems to be). the "don't eat if you can't afford to tip" attitude seems silly.

I agree up to a point, but as has been repeated often in this thread the financial model around this scenario in the US is very different to that in the UK. Wait staff in the UK are generally not well paid, I'd agree but they all get at least minimum wage.

 

[Mem]

Also as far as restaurants go the mark up on food and alcohol in incredible. You can buy a boneless chicken breast in the Supermarket on sale for $1.99 a pound. That makes a half pound breast cost $1. They buy wholesale and bulk so it is cheaper. They add a potato and a veggie and charge $10.

Alcohol is cheap too. You can get about 30 drinks from an Absolute bottle that costs $15 retail and charge $5 per drink.

 

[DC_DEEP]

Also as far as restaurants go the mark up on food and alcohol in incredible. You can buy a boneless chicken breast in the Supermarket on sale for $1.99 a pound. That makes a half pound breast cost $1. They buy wholesale and bulk so it is cheaper. They add a potato and a veggie and charge $10.

Alcohol is cheap too. You can get about 30 drinks from an Absolute bottle that costs $15 retail and charge $5 per drink.

$5 for a call drink? Are you trippin'? That was 15 years ago!

 

[rob_just_rob]

I usually trip fairly well - mainly because the difference between an okay tip and a good tip is negligible in absolute dollars.

I used to think that restaurants should be required to pay waitstaff a living wage and that tipping should be abolished following that - because it's stupid to make people to rely on the capriciousness of strangers for their income. However, lately I've come to believe that this might not be a good idea - most waitstaff don't declare their tips as income, so paying them a better salary would net out to less $$ in their pockets at the end of the day. And it's also possible that service might degrade a bit if they were salaried.