Originally Posted by
serioustraveler
I would say a large majority of anti-tipping people have never worked in the service industry. I base my opinion on observations of people that are strictly anti-tipping versus those that wish the system were different but understand WHY the system exists.
I'm not quite sure I see the distinction.
I'm anti-tipping _because_ I know why the system exists and I disagree with it.
I hope in the "non-tipping" culture you're also factoring in higher restaurant prices.
Of course. That's the point. I'd *much* rather have slightly higher prices on the menu (or whatever) and know that a) staff were being paid a decent wage and consequently b) not have be concerned about supplementing it as a matter of course, or c) not be embarassed/avoid insulting someone by not tipping when it was expected.
If at the end of the day the prices are relatively the same and the service is roughly the same why do people get so hostile towards tipping cultures?
I think that's already been covered pretty well.
The fact is that in Europe if your service sucks you're still paying towards the employee's pay(excluding comps because those can also apply to the US) whereas in the US you can directly penalize the server for crappy service.
Except - by your own standard - the service has to be atrociously bad before you give no tip at all, which is realistically no different (since service that bad in non-tipping locations will likely result in complaints to the manager and is incredibly rare regardless).
At the end of the day the only way I'd truly support a non-tipping system would be if they could eliminate bad servers... unfortunately that would create inflated prices because the good servers would be able to right their own compensation requests.
Bad servers get weeded out in non-tipping cultures just like bad employees of any sort do.
Once again, I'll make the point: if your justification for tipping is to incentivise good service and punish bad service, why aren't you tipping (/not tipping) your doctor ?