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Tipped employees, such as waitresses and bartenders, may sometimes be paid a cash wage that is lower than the prevailing minimum wage through a system known as a tip credit.
In states that allow a tip credit, a certain amount of received tips per hour may be credited against the minimum wage by an employer, although the tipped employee must receive at least the minimum wage (with combined cash wage and tips) each hour.
In Florida the minimum wage for tipped workers is $5.63 per hour. Think about that. A single mom working 40 hours a week makes only $900 a month before tips. It ain't fair but there are plenty of people, especially since Covid, who don't tip because they disagree with the system or get mad at the wait or being asked to wear a mask. If you're not going to tip or tip poorly for whatever reason, please don't eat out. These people work hard in a crappy job taking abuse to barely get by in a lot of cases. Tip your servers people.
In Florida the minimum wage for tipped workers is $5.63 per hour. Think about that. A single mom working 40 hours a week makes only $900 a month before tips. It ain't fair but there are plenty of people, especially since Covid, who don't tip because they disagree with the system or get mad at the wait or being asked to wear a mask. If you're not going to tip or tip poorly for whatever reason, please don't eat out. These people work hard in a crappy job taking abuse to barely get by in a lot of cases. Tip your servers people.
That's a bit misleading, though. Aren't tipped workers still guaranteed the state minimum if tips don't put them at the state minimum (which is increasing to $10 an hour in FL at the end of next month)? So, even if one doesn't tip, one isn't dooming a tipped worker to earning the tipped worker minimum wage.
Moving along, I have stopped tipping or greatly reduced tipping for those states that have enacted a $15/hr (or close to) minimum wage. My rationale is that we were told that is a "living" wage and the best evidence to support tipping before was to make up for a lower tipped wage, which meant that restaurants could keep prices down if they didn't have to make up the difference thanks to tipping. But we are seeing these increased wages getting pushed onto consumers in the form of increased menu item prices, which would have been part of any tip I would have provided under the old system. I don't see why folks should get two bites of the apple.
That's a bit misleading, though. Aren't tipped workers still guaranteed the state minimum if tips don't put them at the state minimum (which is increasing to $10 an hour in FL at the end of next month)? So, even if one doesn't tip, one isn't dooming a tipped worker to earning the tipped worker minimum wage.
Moving along, I have stopped tipping or greatly reduced tipping for those states that have enacted a $15/hr (or close to) minimum wage. My rationale is that we were told that is a "living" wage and the best evidence to support tipping before was to make up for a lower tipped wage, which meant that restaurants could keep prices down if they didn't have to make up the difference thanks to tipping. But we are seeing these increased wages getting pushed onto consumers in the form of increased menu item prices, which would have been part of any tip I would have provided under the old system. I don't see why folks should get two bites of the apple.
Yes. Employer must bring it up to at least minimum, in your Florida case, $10/hr giving that single mom $1600 a month before withholdings to pay her bills. Lacking rudeness on her part, I don't understand, given the opportunity to help a low-wage person who is serving you, not tipping or being stingy with the amount. Your contribution to a charity is usually drastically reduced by administrative costs but a tip is a direct 100% and instant benefit to a person who in a lot of cases really needs it. Please reconsider the way you view tipping. It's a crappy and flawed system but is a wonderful opportunity to directly share some of your good fortune with someone who is not so fortunate. A few dollars more will probably not affect your life but it will help her make the payment on her ragged Corolla or maybe buy her child some new shoes.
Yes. Employer must bring it up to at least minimum, in your Florida case, $10/hr giving that single mom $1600 a month before withholdings to pay her bills. Lacking rudeness on her part, I don't understand, given the opportunity to help a low-wage person who is serving you, not tipping or being stingy with the amount. Your contribution to a charity is usually drastically reduced by administrative costs but a tip is a direct 100% and instant benefit to a person who in a lot of cases really needs it. Please reconsider the way you view tipping. It's a crappy and flawed system but is a wonderful opportunity to directly share some of your good fortune with someone who is not so fortunate. A few dollars more will probably not affect your life but it will help her make the payment on her ragged Corolla or maybe buy her child some new shoes.
Not arguing about tipping generously as I always do but that $1,600/month is also supplemented with the earned income credit to make up for the payroll tax withholding and the enhanced child tax credit. Between them, there should be a pair of shoes in the budget somewhere.
Yes. Employer must bring it up to at least minimum, in your Florida case, $10/hr giving that single mom $1600 a month before withholdings to pay her bills. Lacking rudeness on her part, I don't understand, given the opportunity to help a low-wage person who is serving you, not tipping or being stingy with the amount. Your contribution to a charity is usually drastically reduced by administrative costs but a tip is a direct 100% and instant benefit to a person who in a lot of cases really needs it. Please reconsider the way you view tipping. It's a crappy and flawed system but is a wonderful opportunity to directly share some of your good fortune with someone who is not so fortunate. A few dollars more will probably not affect your life but it will help her make the payment on her ragged Corolla or maybe buy her child some new shoes.
I appreciate your response!
I guess for my part, I don't view tipping as a charity, and even am skeptical about which charities I give to as so much often goes toward overhead. Moreover, I am helping a low-wage person who is serving me as the higher wages per recent minimum wage increases are being passed onto the consumer. To be clear, my point about stopping tipping or reducing my tipping only deals with restaurants in those states/cities that have increased their minimum wage to the $15 or there about.
I see your point about not punishing the worker for the flawed system. And part of me agrees (and I ultimately wouldn't punish the worker in this case, which is why I still do tip where traditionally expected and under the traditional rules and understanding), but another part of me says that if people don't push back we will never change the flawed and crappy system.
We can say that a few dollars more won't affect my life (true, at least in my case), but I again point out that I'm already paying a few dollars more via these higher minimum wages, which are getting passed onto the customer.
In Florida the minimum wage for tipped workers is $5.63 per hour. Think about that. A single mom working 40 hours a week makes only $900 a month before tips. It ain't fair but there are plenty of people, especially since Covid, who don't tip because they disagree with the system or get mad at the wait or being asked to wear a mask. If you're not going to tip or tip poorly for whatever reason, please don't eat out. These people work hard in a crappy job taking abuse to barely get by in a lot of cases. Tip your servers people.
In Florida, the minimum wage is higher than the national minimum wage.
It's $8.46/hr
What this says, and people seem to not understand, is that the employer can pay someone, in Florida, $5.44 an hour.
They can then say, if they get at least $3.02 an hour in tips, they meet the state minimum wage.
Not sure where you got the $5.63 from.
Under no (legal) circumstances would your theoretical 40 hour a week mom make less than $1353.60 in a month.. Assuming 4 full weeks of 40 hours. In pay. Take home is another story.
Don't get me wrong that i'm saying this theoretical person, who likely exists somewhere, is making too little or too much.. But.. same person, who doesn't work as a server.. They get $1353.60, period. They don't have additional tip income.
A good server makes far, far more than that $1353.60 a month.
I'd also say.. Cash tips left on the table are NEVER reported to the IRS, so that's 'free money'.. Probably only a small portion of servers are reporting their ACTUAL tips from credit cards to the IRS for taxation. And those only because the POS system automatically does it for the employer.
What I'm curious to read about is the states that say "see 2 wage types".. I don't see a definition of that.
Not to mention.. In CA.. If all holds true here.. $11.00/hr is the minimum.. And if they work more than 8 hours a day, that's OT, which is $16.50 an hour. AND, they work 7 days straight, that 7th day is all Double Time. So, $22/hr.
Further.. For the opposite viewpoint.. Something I consider BS is that employers are allowed to garnish workers' tips in order to cover CC processing fees. I think there's a limit, something like 4% or so.. But, if I tip you $10.. The owner of the establishment is LEGALLY able to garnish 40 cents of that. Blew my mind when I heard of that.. And the weirder thing, when I did hear about it, I said "No way California allows that".. Yep, they do. Makes you wonder.. There's probably some asshat owner out there that charges a 4% surcharge for credit transaction and then garnishes 4% from worker tips. Hopefully there's some law against that.
I got the $5.63 from the Dept of Labor website for minimum wages.
Ok.. The link on the OP shows $5.44 as the minimum, with $3.02 coming from tips for a total of $8.46
So.. One of them is wrong. If I had to bet.. I'd say the site that was posted here was wrong and not the DoL.
But, sub in your numbers there and what I posted still holds true.
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