> but until such things transpire we have an ethical obligation to tip and tip well, right?

I don't think so, no. I don't think there is any ethical obligation to tip at all, and there never has been.

I am under no ethical obligation to be abused by companies using their employees as human shields.

I agree you’re not under an ethical obligation to be abused, but to use a company’s services where all parties expect you to tip, and then you don’t that’s unethical as well. You don’t get to have your cake and eat it too.

The only unethical thing here is pretending you are owed money without telling the other party they owe you money.

I agree, but here’s your notification: if you go to a bar or restaurant and receive service you should tip.

If you don’t like this, don’t go.

It's not that simple. If I go to a restaurant and order at the counter tipping is typically considered to be entirely optional, in spite of the fact that the PoS system would like you to think it isn't.

Then there's the whole spectrum of space in between. What about order-at-counter but the food is brought to you when it's ready, but you then clean up after yourself? What about a buffet, where you pay at a counter, serve yourself, but someone comes and cleans up your plates?

An alternative heuristic that I've heard is that if you pay in advance than tipping is optional, while if you pay at the end it's required, but that doesn't cover Doordash.

There are clear cut cases where tipping is required, and a whole fuzzy mess in between. And that fuzzy mess gets fuzzier and messier each year as companies intentionally blur the line.

I receive service everywhere I go, from the people who clean floors and bathrooms to the people who make food to the people who stock shelves, and even do engineering drawings for me.

People can expect whatever they want, but there is no actual obligation to tip. It's not a matter of wanting my cake and eating it too, it's a matter of rejecting the premise that what should be a way of expressing appreciation is being subverted by employers to underhandedly supplement wages.

If the tipping is actually mandatory, then build it into the price to begin with. That way, perhaps tipping can go back to being an actual expression of thanks.

But isn't being a patron of one these companies precisely the thing that does put you in this kind of obligation?

Isn't the whole thing about human shields that we don't want to hurt the humans in question?

No, I reject the premise that there is an actual obligation to tip. The obligation is to pay the bill.

Ok! Sorry about that, and good luck with everything.

Sure, in situations where tipping is factored into the wage, if you use a service you should tip. I get around that by mostly avoiding such services.

But the situation here isn't a clear-cut case like a sit-down restaurant where tipping is expected. If I were handed a receipt like the one in the article for my family's tickets and food, it wouldn't occur to me for a second that the barkeep in the room next door was relying on me tipping on this popcorn purchase in order to make a decent wage on this kids movie night.

It is a clear cut situation though: at Alamo drafthouse you order just like a restaurant, and a server will even greet you and get drink orders before the movie begins. It is full table service throughout the movie, where you order by writing on slips of paper. You get a bill at the end for your meal.

But, in general, this shouldn't even be the point. You should always assume that leaving a tip for someone in a position to receive it is a worthwhile gesture that means a significant amount!

I don't even know how this is so contentious to people honestly. Why make such a point about not doing something nice and relatively small? Your gonna spend $15 bucks on an IPA anyway, why not just help someone out too? Are you worried the bartender is going to get paid too much?

This is a pretty privileged take. Not everyone who can afford to buy Subway for lunch can afford to pay 15% more for it.

Tipping has become contentious lately because it's been asserting itself as an opt-out part of every Square checkout flow, even in situations where we never used to tip like fast casual order-at-the-counter. In the era of Uber we're also frequently asked to pick a tip before we even receive the service, which feels more like extortion than "something nice". Tipping is becoming more and more contentious because tipping is changing, and the version you describe is quickly becoming the minority case.

Ok! Sorry to waste your time then, good luck with all that.