Julia Altshuler wrote:

> Ellie C wrote:
>
>> Gee, with tip cups showing up all over could it possibly be a symptom
>> of the fact that people need to make more than $7 per hour? THat's a
>> fine wage if you're a high school kid but there's lots of folks who
>> have these jobs as their full time work. Could you live on $7 per hour?
>
>
>
> There's no doubt that $7/hour is not a lot of money. The question, for
> me, is how the higher wage should get delivered to the worker. I'd like
> the employer to take care of it. The tip system is all weird and wrong.
> The tip is supposed to be optional so you'd think that if you don't
> like paying the tip you don't have to. But then the worker gets
> screwed. You end up with a cycle like this:
>
>
> Employer pays worker too little.
> Customer thinks worker should get paid more and therefore tips.
> Employer realizes tips are turning job into a well paid one.
> Employer figures out way to get hands into the tip jar.
> Customer must tip MORE to give worker a living wage.
>
>
> For example, at many coat and package check places at museums and
> convention halls, the workers never see the so called tips. Management
> takes them outright.
>
>
> --Lia
>
Yes, I agree. I live in France now and here tipping is simply an extra,
not a counted-on part of the salary for wait staff. I don't know much
about the salaries of wait staff, but being a waiter or waitress here
isn't looked on as a dead end job. It seems to be looked on as no
different from being a baker or a butcher or whatever. It's also nice to
have had the same waitress in the local restaurant for the 5 years we've
been eating there. Oh another thing that's quite different is the number
of tables served by a waiter or waitress. Here you almost never see more
than one server in a restaurant unless it's a large restaurant in the
busy season. So perhaps this one person has a job that might be shared
by two or more in a similar restaurant in the US.