I think as well something that would be concerning regarding the quality of service of the places that you're talking about that the quality of service depends upon how much money is being given, and less things that oftentimes help people perform on the job better (non-toxic environment, healthy egoless leadership, good colleagues, good company ethos and ethics, etc).
Obviously pay is important, it's a job after all, but people can't magic the willpower to perform well for money out of nowhere. I think that's up to the company to protect and foster that kind of a productive workplace where people can achieve their potential.
One sensible metric is that you should be able to support yourself while living in the area you work (or an area nearby such that it isn't a significant financial hardship or timesink to commute to work). Service jobs largely fail on that metric, effectively using government money and family support structures to cover the gap.
This is problem with basing wages on an individual needs, in reality the wage you are paid should have, and does have nothing to do with the amount of money you "need" to support yourself.
it is just a arbitrary wage picked by legislatures exactly like a "minimum wage" law only the "living wage" seems to apply to older people, where "minimum wage" laws apply to everyone. For example a 20yo in the UK can make "minimum wage" but a 24yo will need to make "living wage" both of which are just numbers pulled out of thin air, not connected to "the amount of money you need to support yourself. "
The living wage is not in the UK. Dispute the method all you want of course, but there is a method:
Yes, it gets complicated, but “$7.25/hr isn’t enough” is not complicated.
Not everything needs a government mandate. Every drive thru, and service job I see is has $13, $15, $16 per hour wages, and this is in the midwest where the median income is hovering around 50-55K
San Francisco can be a playground for the rich until they get sick of paying for $30 lattes or whatever and flee to low cost locales like Manhattan that have affordable housing and transit.
It won’t be “fixed” until we’re backed into an economic corner where it becomes politically acceptable for the property owners to lose bazillions of dollars.
I don't know how you got to that, other than by assuming that nice areas have to be expensive. The fact that SF is unable to achieve both is an indicator of broken local markets and politics, not an ironclad rule for every other locality.
Edit: Another framing is that "nice" and "fancy" are different things, as much as extremely unequal markets like SF distort the distinction.
This is generally the case. I can’t think of a single counter example.
Most of the US satisfies these constraints, especially if you own and don't mind driving a car.
That's factually untrue and kind of an absurd statement. Of course people live in Manhattan working as servers.
The idea that a job shouldn't exist if it is only something that would interest a high-school student or uneducated young adult who is willing to live with lots of roommates creates fewer opportunities at the low end--not more.
You mean like most restaurants in europe? Yes the service there is on average worse than in American restaurants because of tips, but in my opinion not by enough of a margin to cost me 20% every time. The times that you would tip at a eu restaurant, its something reasonable well below the ridiculous 20% average that American businesses have swindled into existence
The US has a less hard sell model and free refills. That changes alot of the dynamics
Also if you are drinking alcohol (and only Alcohol) with EVERY meal, well you may have a problem
hmmmm
>>but it might be that service in general is poorer now.
I wonder why that might be? You have allowed emotion to screw the system. the entire purpose off a tip is pay for the service. no serivce no tip. People work of incentives, if they know they will get 20% no matter what why would or should they give you good service?
you set the expectation, and now complain that people have given you exactly what you expected of them
Although based on some recent news articles I found when I tried searching for a more definitive source, tip amounts have gone down in the past year or so.
They better just raise the menu price, any place that has a 20% service charge added automatically (outside the standard large party ) will never get my patronage again
>> once you add sales tax
that is nothing like Sales Tax. Sales tax is a fee the government is charging ME that the business is mandated by the government to collect on my behalf, I owe the tax not the business. People often do not understand that context. Just like when your employer taxes out of your paycheck, you owe the income tax but the employer is mandated to collect it because the government do not trust you with your own money.
Similar to the argument against unions.
I have one such restaurant near me and I neither hate it nor experience bad service. It's been like this a few years and they're doing fine.
I’ve travelled all over the world and I don’t find the service in America to be that much better honestly.
I have no problems looking them in the eye and pressing 0% -- No Tip.
Citation needed. My experiences at no-tipping restaurants have been the absolute opposite of your claims: great food, great service, and no fucking around with tipping afterwards.
If I'm at a restaurant, I really don't want to have much interaction with most of the staff; I'm there to talk to my dining party and to eat and drink. _Really_ good wait staff know this and are attentive (e.g. to your drinks, or can notice when you need them), personable when they're there, but otherwise you don't notice them. I think tipping culture discourages this, as being invisible isn't an obvious way to get a tip.
I just wanted to share the fact that there are places where tips are shared by the whole staff, and that system works well (I can't say if it works worse or better than the one you're describing as I don't have much experience with it). It also has the advantage that non-public-facing staff (e.g., cooks) get their share of tips too.
There have been restaurants have tried non-tipping models, consumers and staff both hate it. First the highly productive staff often make less under that model (where poor performers make more), consumers hate it because the menu prices increase, and you end up with McD's level customer service where drinks are never refilled, and service overall degrades.