1. We don’t tip workers in those other fields you mentioned because they make a livable wage. Food service workers, particularly servers, often make less than minimum wage.

2. I’m glad wherever you live pays their wait staff a livable wage. If that happened in the US, tipping wouldn’t be the way it is now. Unfortunately the system has to change first. Until it does, if a customer patronizes a restaurant, they should tip. If someone can’t afford to tip, they should stay home.

3. The “invisible hand of the market” isn’t going to solve this issue. A change in labor law will. We either need state or federal laws to protect food service workers. Then employers will be forced to pay their staff better and tipping won’t be so compulsory.

Okay? So push for better laws and higher minimum wage on one hand and until those changes are made, then tip with the other. We can do both at the same time. Right?

How does withholding a tip end the current system?

Customers who don’t tip are. They are punishing a worker for the crimes of a system. The restaurant owner/manager doesn’t suffer if you don’t tip. Only the workers do. So until a change comes to the system where workers get paid minimum wage, not tipping isn’t morally defensible.

If you live in a place where food service workers are underpaid and you don’t tip, you’re an asshole. This is not a morally defensible stance unless there is a system to protect those workers already in place.

Evidence?

This has been my background for a bit. It’s from an artist whose work I’ve followed for a while. https://ko-fi.com/asmeesh/

My lock screen is the living universe animated wallpaper of the moon and its current phase.

I’m listening to the audiobook of Babel by RF Kuang. The narration is pretty great but I don’t know how I feel about the story as a whole yet.

I’m also reading Junot Diaz’s Drown on the recommendation of a work friend. Interesting how both books use the narrator’s native language to help color the stories.