Bigotry Vs Experience

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So call the cops and charge people with a crime. Oh yeah, there's no legal protection for that. But oddly there is if someone runs out on the bill. The whole setup is a BS excuse for employers to pay less than the work is worth.

(And yes I do tip, if you're wondering, because I know service professions are explicitly underpaid.)

Some are making a genetic argument here, and I'm wondering how serious they are. Aren't women known for being stingier tippers than men? Would you attribute that to genetic differences as well?

Nah, it's quite possible you aren't the one discriminating, but the one being discriminated against. Urban Culture could be bigoted against those in the service industry, and so refuse to tip regardless of how well they are served.

It's just important to realize that if that is true, it's a culture thing and not something inherent to being black.

In general, many stereotypes are demonized heuristics. I have pinpointed many blatant distortions of rational thought in my college years where people try to promote counterproductive and sub-optimal strategies in the interest of being "fair". I do not view many "stereotypes" as more or less wrong than using a rule of thumb because one finds it too difficult to arrive at a proper evaluation of the evidence. The individual is within their moral right to use a strategy to maximize their payoff at the expense of socially constructed "groups".

Do a lot of people know you're supposed to tip delivery men?? I always tip 10-15% in restaurants.

I don't like in the UK (thank god), and in the US, you tip. In my profession, you are paid less in the anticipation of tips, it's generally understood in this country. I'm not talking about foreigners here, though they are also a notoriously poor tipping group. After repeated stiffs, I may ask them if we are doing something wrong, and when it is explained to them they become regular tippers. The "urban element" however, knows better and chooses to stiff. I stay in the industry because I make decent money at a job that works well with my AS, but the obnoxious stiffs do get to me. I'll tell you what though, I keep track, and after a couple chances, I will actively try to lose someone's business, through methods best left to your imagination...

In the US that is low, 18-20+% is normal these days for good sit down service. Delivery people would like to see 15%, though a good rule of thumb is at least the cost of 1 gallon of gas. $5 is usually good on any order up to about $40 too. The other pet peeve of delivery drivers is that any delivery charge on the order does not go to the driver! The store does that so that they don't have to raise menu prices, because they are scared of losing the cheapskate market, and customers often take the DC out of the driver's tip. They keep the delivery charge, and give the driver a pittance for gasoline and maintenance.

Well, most male and female differences are genetic, obviously. I understand that if you carry out certain tests to measure various aspects of cognitive function, then the pattern of results will be distinct for each sex. Possibly that's related to hormones. It's not a huge leap from there to speculate that those diferences could play a role in behaviour, which may include the willingness to tip. You can say the same about various races. The problem is that most people are unwilling to consider things from that angle because they're brainwashed by the media and government in the name of "equality" to believe that sex and race are meaningless.

Oh my go- So then the reason why eastern european women are more submissive than western european women MUST be due to hormones or genetic differences. THAT MAKES SO MUCH SENSE NOW!!

I'm not trying to be mean here, but learn proper argumentation. Ascan made a valid point about the possibility of gender differences having an impact on behavior, and you made an invalid comparison about an unrelated behavior. The fact that gender differences may be responsible for one behavior, does not mean that they are responsible for all behaviors. The more submissive behavior of Eastern European women has absolutely no bearing on the generosity, or lack there of, of American women, but bringing it up allows you to get all sarcastic because you were told something you didn't want to hear, which ironically enough was partially the point of Ascan's post. This is elementary logic, something that I find notably lacking here sometimes...

not really. your argument, and ascan's argument, is that differences in behaviour can be a result of genetic differences between race/gender. ascan at least was not speaking about any specific behaviour, but making a more general point.

you never answered my previous question. are you suggesting that all black people are poor tippers, or only those who identify with urban culture. since you implied that identification with urban culture may be the deciding factor in your theory on tipping, but clearly not all black people identify with urban culture.

You may disagree with Me or Ascan's points, but Merr's argument was still totally invalid.

To answer your question though, I feel that urban culture is the real culprit in the poor tipping problem. All of the studies on the matter though, and there have been studies, have only used race. Although not all black people are culturally black, or to use the current euphemism, "urban", the culture did originate with them. I believe I did actually clarify in a previous post that the more accurate way of putting in would be that it's not that most blacks don't tip, but that most people who don't tip are black. I'm actually not even sure that I would say most, though it is definitely far out of proportion to the number of black customers that I have. If you read through some of the posts on my delivery driver's board, some of them put the numbers as high as 70-90% of their black customers who don't tip. I've worked as a driver in two different states, and the blacks not tipping thing was consistent in both, it's not regional, and it's not just me. The black girl I dated for 6 years was very aware of the stereotype, and would actually go out of her way to tip heavily because she was embarrassed by it. I do get black customers like that, the over compensating huge tip, but it's invariably from the non-culturally black person, the one you'd mistake for white on the phone.

To summarize (not just this post):

People who are "culturally black" seldom tip, regardless of race.

The majority of black people are culturally black.

Those blacks who are not black identified are aware of and embarrassed by the non tippers.

This is a sustained trend crossing geographic areas over a long period of time.

Black service people also report poor tips from black customers.

University studies have confirmed that blacks tip lower on average than other races.

Given all these things, when I take an order on the phone and the person placing the order is speaking in black vernacular English (ghetto talk, to you un-PC folks), I don't get my hopes up for a big tip. If my fears are confirmed upon delivery, they get a black mark next to their name. If they stiff me more than twice, I give them the worst service I can, same as any other repeat stiff. At least with me, they get the chance to prove me wrong, and sometimes they do. However, my snap judgment on the phone is right more often than you'd like to think.

I don't tip too much (in comparison to others--usually 12-16%)as I've not much money to begin with.

I always give a dollar and the change whenever I order delivery pizza, which is rare because I usually pick it up now. I recall a person I know didn't tip the pizza deliveryman. Meh.

Some people are naturally cheap. Some feel they are entitled. Humility is something that needs to be taught in every grade.

After all, if your bill is $30 for a meal, you're poor in spirit if you can't give an extra $5.

When I first heard about tipping, I thought it was greedy. Now I see there is more to it than I first though. But I won't tip for bad service. The employers shouldn't be so stingy and they should pay their staff a proper wage instead of expecting the customers to make up the difference all the time.

We don't have tipping in Australia - if we think somebody has done an extra special job, we might give them a note and tell them to keep the change.

Unfortunately, restaurant owners have a better lobby than restaurant employees. In some states it's legal to pay tipped employees $2.13 an hour, it's really despicable. I don't know where this idea that the restaurant industry should be subsidized in it's payroll expenses came from, but it's ridiculous if you ask me. Some high end waiters, okay I can see if you're making hundreds of dollars in tips a night, the pittance of a wage doesn't matter. When you're a delivery driver with car expenses, the restaurants should be ashamed.

However, if you object to the tipping system so much, I'd advise you to simply not go to restaurants if and when you come to the states. If you fail to tip, it really is like you are stealing from your server, while the restaurant still pockets your money. As I mentioned earlier, waiters are often required to pay 5% of their gross sales to their support staff, on the presumption of a 20% tip. So if you stiff your waiter on a $100 tab, you've actually taken $5 out of his pocket. Now consider that foreigners are a notoriously poor tipping bunch, and there's a reason you may experience poor service in America. If you find you are getting poor service in a sit down restaurant here, it's wouldn't be out of line to discreetly pull your waiter aside to let him know that unlike those other tourists, you understand tipping. Just see if the service doesn't pick up.

What about if the waiter keeps ignoring you when you try to get their attention? I would consider that poor service.