Originally Posted by
SocietyFlyGirl
They are NOT like bonuses per U.S. law.
If you can't bear to tip, please don't come to the U.S. and eat in a restaurant then. It's incredibly culturally insensitive to come to a country where tips are thought to be part of the waiter's/server's wages and not tip. As has been pointed out, servers in the U.S. are paid a minimum wage far below others (it's around iirc $2.55 an hour) AND are taxed on the tips they receive ...and if they claim far fewer tips than they've received (say, they've only served non-tippers like yourself) then the IRS can select them for review for tax fraud.
So is the waiter really being stiffed/investigated for tax fraud if a diner pays the UK norm of 12.5% for normal service, offering perhaps 15%+ for perfection?
The advantage of tipping is that U.S. restaurants are often cheaper than UK or European restaurants of similar quality, so by tipping, you are not paying MORE than you would in another culture, you are just bringing it up to par.
Not true any more IME, not for anything above the McDonalds level, compared with the UK. But it's not really relevant anyway. I pay less for food in Cambodia, nobody's expecting a 500% tip there, to make it 'up to par'.