ZOE ROGERS / OPINION EDITOR

How  many  times have you felt pressured to tip someone whose only job is to take your order? Tipping culture nowadays has gotten out of hand. Customers are expected to provide a tip ranging from 15 to 25 percent of their order, significantly increasing the money poured out of their bank account. However, most of the time, customers feel the pressure to tip because they’re aware of the low wage that the employee  receives. It’s time to get rid of tipping culture altogether and start implementing liveable wages instead. 

On my recent trip to Japan over Christmas break, I went through  culture shock. Not only were the Japanese fundamentally nicer than the average American walking down the street of San Diego, but they also had no trace of tipping culture. I learned that the Japanese take the tip as more of a handout, basically implying that they should get paid more for their work, which they don’t think is the case. 

Tipping can be seen as offensive in Japan, reflecting negatively on the employee’s duties and implying  that the employer is not properly paying their workers.  

Start Travel, a website dedicated to travel information and destination guides, provided cultural information explaining why tipping is not accepted in Japanese culture. 

“It is in the Japanese culture to take pride in your work,” Start Travel explained.  “As such, employees have the highest standards when supplying a service and don’t feel the need to accept tips to feel appreciated. To the Japanese, attempting to give a tip suggests their employer does not value them enough to offer sufficient pay.” 

In the United States, tipping has become extremely prevalent. We are expected to tip at almost every establishment that we walk into. Sometimes, I struggle with pressing the “no tip” button on the screen as I stare sheepishly at the cashier. Having the tipping device in front of you can make you feel extremely uncomfortable, especially when it feels like the employee is eagerly awaiting a tip. 

My friend has a rule that goes, “If I’m not sitting, I’m not tipping,” which I’ve begun implementing into my own life. I personally feel more inclined to tip at a restaurant than a coffee shop. 

Tipping has become a cultural norm that we see all over the nation. At this point, it seems as if I am going to start having the  tipping display screen offered to me whenever someone holds the door open for me. 

The U.S. has had a long history of tipping. TIME, an American news magazine based in New York City, reported on the beginning of the American tipping culture. 

“Wealthy Americans in the 1850s and 1860s discovered the tradition which had originated in medieval times as a master-serf custom wherein a servant would receive extra money for having performed superbly well, on vacations in Europe,” TIME wrote. 

Our relationship with tipping culture has evolved significantly since the late 1800s. Tipping surfaced as a way of rewarding serfs. Now, we don’t see our food service workers as servants, we see them as people with rights equal to all workers. Workers’ wages should reflect this factor, and tipping should be resolved because employees should be compensated fairly for their work. While the original incentive behind tipping is significantly outdated, it is still a practice in our everyday life. 

The U.S. Department of Labor, a federal agency that promotes labor laws and worker’s rights, provided information on the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and its application to employee tipping. 

“Under the FLSA, a tipped employee is an employee engaged in an occupation in which they customarily and regularly receive more than $30 a month in tips,” the U.S. Department of Labor stated. 

The agency also provided that tipped employees can oftentimes earn less than usual minimum wages. This statement is typically used by employers to justify low pay, saying that the employee makes up for the low pay with tips. There isn’t a way to guarantee how many tips the employees can receive in a day, and relying on tips can be insufficient for the employee, especially because they live their day hoping the customer clicks the 25 percent button on the screen. Instead, employers should pay employees the appropriate salary for their occupation. 

The National Employment Law Project (NELP), a nonprofit advocacy organization that supports quality jobs for workers, elaborated on how much bartenders rely on tips. 

“Waiters and bartenders earn more in tips than they do from what employers pay them as an hourly base wage,” NELP stated. “The median share of hourly earnings that come from tips account for 58.5 percent of wait staff’s earnings, and 54 percent of  bartenders’ earnings.” 

The NELP project emphasizes the need to turn away from the system of paying workers low wages, and ultimately make up for it in tips. Living off of tips can be insufficient and unreliable, so eliminating employee reliance would benefit our society. 

Tipping is a subjective act. We just go off of how well the service was executed, and how much dedication the employee invested in providing a service to the customer. Although there is an unspoken rule that 20 percent is standard for good service, everyone tips differently. Forcing employees to rely on the tips of customers is problematic and can oftentimes be inconsistent depending on the day. In addition, tipping disparities have become prevalent based on the demographic of the worker. 

Render, a print magazine that focuses on the food industry, investigated the reasoning behind gender tipping disparities using studies conducted  by Matthew Parrett for the Journal of Labor Research.

“What Dr. Parrett found was that men and women earned about the same in tips when the service was perceived to be “exceptional,” but that for any lower service quality, women’s tips were lower than men’s,” the article explained.

Some may say that tipping incentivizes good service, and that the low wages should not matter because the employee will be getting their money’s worth from tips anyways. 

However, tipping is subjective to who is being waited on, and even when workers provide excellent service, a tip is not guaranteed. As for the lower wages, they are often more practical for employers, especially when employees receive substantial tips. Rather than budgeting extra funds for wages, employers can invest that money in purchasing resources and store products.  However, it should be an employer’s job to provide wages for workers, not customers.

Eliminating tipping and implementing liveable wages would significantly benefit our society and culture. By removing tipping, customers can focus on better ways to show appreciation, such as advocating for liveable wages and fair compensation to all workers. Making this change would allow for employees to be valued for their quality of work, not just their demographic.

Eliminating tipping from our culture as a whole would benefit us in multiple social aspects. Not only can tipping be inconsistent depending on the customer and depending on the day, but also expecting employees to generate  tips due to their low  wage is a problematic and unstable form of income. 

Tipping correctly can be tricky, and evaluating how much to tip, and when, is a whole other battle. The social pressure to tip is inescapable in our daily lives. If we  implemented liveable wages and stopped tipping, we wouldn’t have to feel bad after clicking the “no tip” button. 

If you’ve bought anything, ever, you’ve probably seen this tip screen.  Alissa Abramovich/The USD Vista