PDT 2/2 : Why has tipping increased?

[gonores]

I'd say one factor would have to be the acceptance of the transitional phase between young adult and adult. Back in the day, lots of people went straight from high school in to a career-oriented job. Some went to college, but obv way less than the number going today. Today, it's much more acceptable for kids to spend some time dicking around (either in college or elsewhere) before choosing a career. I'd venture to say that the majority of these people spend at least a little time in the service industry during this transitional phase.

Therefore

1. More people can sympathize with the amount of work that goes into serving because they themselves worked in the service industry (plus, everyone now has "that guy" in their group of friends who always needs to point out that he tips well because he knows what it's like to have to live off tips).
2. The quality of the person performing the job has gone from "dumpy 40-something chain-smoker mother of 3 who couldn't cut it as a paralegal" to "perky, energetic college kid who has other things going for her besides this side job." It stands to reason that quality of service would rise as well.

[hicherbie]

well on the service end its obvious why its expected to go up. why wouldnt you expect more money all the time if you work hard? the limit on this expectation is how much people are willing to pay. i think this has risen over time because of societal pressures to look generous. i would think this is pronounced by the fact that we tip all the time and it kind of sucks to think youre a cheap bastard 5 times a week.

[Dale Dough]

Are people in the US in general better off financially than before?

As far as I can tell, there seems to be a correlation between the standards of living of a country and the amount people expect you to pay vs. what they quote you. The richer the people, the more generosity is implicitly required of them. You are expected to be a gentleman about this - and if you really can't afford it you can just pay the stated price. Poorer people are expected to haggle, so they are quoted higher prices initially. And if you're rich (tourist) you just pay the higher price without bitching.

Just a guess.

[NoSoup4U]

One possible explanation is that the IRS has gotten much more effective at taxing tips. In the old days, a tip of 10-15% went 100% in the server's pocket. Only a very small fraction of tips were reported as income. Now that the IRS requires employers to impute tip income to servers, a tip of 20% probably leaves the waiter with the same income after tax that they used to get.

[Sciolist]

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Why have standard tipping amounts/expectations increased over time?

[/ QUOTE ]
Not read the other posts yet, but I think there're two reasons in the US. The former hasn't happened in the UK so far as I know, which might explain the difference in tipping culture.

1. Tips are taxed effectively. The IRS assumes you receive tips of a certain percentage, and so the value of a tip is reduced

2. Whilst the poorest people are richer now than 20 years ago, the richest are a LOT richer. Therefore, it costs them a similiar percentage of their dispoable income to tip 20% today vs. 10% 20 years ago

[Sciolist]

[ QUOTE ]
Tipping in Ireland has, as far as I can tell, gone way up over the last 10-20 years. Not to US levels, but to more than almost anywhere else in the world. I think this is because the country has become more Americanized, and much more prosperous with an economic boom beginning in the early 90s and still felt today.

I doubt this helps explain an increase in tipping in the US, but I thought another data point would be useful.

[/ QUOTE ]
This is probably a function of more disposable income, Ireland has become a lot richer in the last 20 years.

[stinkypete]

they tried to autograt my party of five freakin people ~19.5% last night (they do 18% but the jerkhole of a waiter added it after tax). the service was somewhere between mediocre and poor.

i don't know why, but i do know it's retarded.

[ahnuld]

It really depends on the country. I speak to my friend who wait tables here in montreal and most tips range from 10-20% with 15% still the norm. Sales tax here is 15% so its pretty easy to just copy the taxes. Maybe that specific coincidence has prevented tip inflation from occurring.

In terms of a hypothesis on US tip inflation, id guess that its due to our culture becoming a more service driven economy and people realize the difficulty of a service job because they have experience in something somewhat similar. If you get a mechanic in the sixties who goes out to dinner he think that the idea that a waiter works really hard is funny, because he views all service jobs below his tough, real-job. Now there are less and less people like that around

[PartyGirlUK]

Diablo, I'd be interested to see how the wages of servers v. the mean wage has altered since you were in college. I'd guess that servers wages have risen less in real terms that the general increase in wealth. This would be my explanation.

D

[ahnuld]

dean, not true. If you look at restaurant prices im pretty sure you'll find that they rose proportionally to the level of wealth. Things like that dont really change over time so much because people are willing to allocate x% of their income to eating out, so when incomes rise so does the amount they will spend on dinners and the restaurant owners raise their prices.