We decided on a burger for dinner last night, so Five Guys it was. Dr. SJ did the ordering and, when she was done, informed me that my personal favorite, the bacon cheeseburger, was now $12.39. What? I quickly checked the google machine, and a website updated as of April, 2022, said it costs $8.69. But on the Five Guys online ordering website for the store by me, it was most definitely $12.39.
To be fair, they informed us of the price and we decided to order anyway. High as it might be, we made our choice. But then, what about the tip?
Paying via tablet is now the convenient norm at pizzerias, coffee shops, fast food joints and other quick-service spots across the city, but the gadgets are quick to ask if you want to add a healthy gratuity to your order. Touchscreens typically prompt patrons to leave a tip ranging from 18 to 30% — and sometimes even higher — when they grab and go.
The NY Post calls this “guilt tipping,” which is not merely a cute turn of phrase, but an accurate one as well. There it was, when time came to pay, the opportunity to add a tip to the purchase. There are no servers. There is no table service. Yet there was the subtle pressure to add a tip.
Occasionally, the prompts replace the old tip jar — upping the ante on what was customarily a tossed buck or some loose change. But in many instances, patrons are being pressured to pony up at places where they’ve never been expected to tip before — say, for waiting on line for their burgers and fries at Five Guys. And they’re not happy about the sudden ubiquity of gratuity gauging.
Over the past few years, much has been made about the hard work and poor wages of service people. There is, of course, the argument that these are “unskilled” jobs, meaning that there is neither special education, experience nor licensing required such that they’re fungible. Anyone can be hired without any credentials and taught to flip a burger. Others will argue that no job is “unskilled,” and it’s demeaning to suggest such a thing.
But the fact remains that tipping has now found its way into purchases for which there is no tradition of tipping, because the employees need more money. Won’t you think of the poor employees?
“I was somewhere spending $23 on just coffee and pastries and the suggested tip was another $8 and I simply said no way. I’ll give a dollar or so as a custom tip amount, but let’s have a reality check here,” said Jared Goodman, a 26-year-old recruiter who lives in Brooklyn. “Recently I got a quick bite with my girlfriend and the suggested tip amounts were 25, 35 and even 40%. That’s just insane.”
On the one hand, there is a fair probability that the purchasers of foodstuffs aren’t much wealthier than the makers. Should a person making minimum wage be guilted into paying another person making minimum wage a tip?
On the other hand, tips are calculated as a percentage of the purchase price, so inflated prices (I’m thinking of you, Five Guys) means inflated tips. From the customer’s side of the counter, is handing someone an overpriced coffee and pastry really a tip-worthy event?
Similarly, Linda Flaxer and Mary Canner left a $10 gratuity for two lobster rolls they ordered from a Times Square stall.
“I love [the tablet concept], I try to be generous with tipping,” Flaxer, a Lincoln Square resident and writing tutor, told The Post, noting she will even tip 20% on takeout meals. “Those people are working really hard … I want these places to stay in business.”
And despite any kvetching, most city dwellers seem to agree: Many New Yorkers voluntarily tip 25%, according to a Popmenu report from December.
Apparently, the answer is yes, a lot of people tip, and tip well, just because. And if you don’t, you look like some mean cheapskate who hates poor, hardworking people.
“Personally, I view that the tip culture where we live has become part of the norm to the point where people don’t view it as any sort of pressure,” he added. “Whether you want to do it or not is completely up to the patron.”
Sure, be a decent moral human being or be you. Do you really want to be that selfish tightwad who hates humanity?
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Are you sure it was 5 Guys’ website instead of a clone designed to inflate food costs?
There’s actually a class action lawsuit about this.
No, I’m a blithering fucking idiot and need you to explain to me how the google machine works because you’re so very brilliant.Yes, Grant. I’m sure, but thank you for your warning and concern.
As to your last question, all I can say is, its a dirty job, but someones gotta do it.
Nice to have you back.
Way back when I used to wait tables, 15% was considered a good tip and five or ten percent was common. But there was a recession going on and inflation was rampant.
Myself personally, I tip 20-25% when I eat out or get food delivered and either a couple of bucks or ten percent when I have to go pick dinner up.
Pretty soon, the robot at McDonald’s that takes your order is going to expect a gratuity.
Back when, we all took a job waiting tables at some inexpensive restaurant at some point and were pretty happy to make some spending money. This was on the way to a career, not the end point.
People don’t have to be selfish tightwads who hate humanity to have this policy hurt the people it’s trying to help. Like with covid restrictions (and we need a corollary to Godwin’s Law: everything relates to Covid sooner or later), what is missing from the common analysis is what is not seen. The additional “option” to tip is price increase and with that, the quantity demanded will decrease, sales will drop and fewer workers will be hired.
(And because tipping is uncertain for the seller, and because there are psychic costs to the tipper –should I tip? did I tip enough? –there are further deadweight losses, making a tip optional policy worse than a price increase equal to the average tip.)
PS Even with a hefty tip, it’s less than two cents per calorie, about the same price as raw kale. Your decision to order is understandable.
Businesses will realize when they’ve priced themselves out of the market. Young people, on the other hand, seem to lack any functional grasp of microeconomics.
if you are saying that I have a grasp of microeconomics, I thank you, but if you are implying that I am not a young person I must disagree: I am trans-millennial, identifying as somebody born in 1983. My abiding knowledge of the 1970s comes strictly from Mad magazines bought on Ebay and youtube clips of Three’s Company and The Love Boat.
(Though come to think of it, the original version “If you are not a liberal when you are young, you have no heart and if you are not a conservative when you are old you have no brain” pegged old to be 30, consistent with Jerry Rubin’s adage. So maybe even with my newly discovered age, I am still an alter kocker.
We’re gonna need to work on your yiddish.
Many years ago a lawyer friend went to court with me for suspended license offense. He didn’t do anything special but his being there on my behalf was special and significantly mitigated my circumstances.
He didn’t charge me a penny. He said my other clients pay for you….
So hopefully I don’t sound like a dead beat; I’m not. I’m just here to thank those that find it necessary to tip far more than warranted or appropriate… so I don’t feel obligated to!
Who doesn’t love the appreciative freeloader?
It’s not even really a tip. It’s an offloaded “server fee.” It’s a far cry from the cash you could leave on the table for the individual server who took care of your needs, or at least add to a credit card ticket attached to that server. Even a tip jar shared by employees feels less sketchy than having corporate handle it.
It’s probably just an American thing, because we’re told this all has something to do with slavery and America’s 3% domination of that injustice. Maybe they should include an “add reparations?” prompt.
What is the differential between the tipped minimum wage and the overall minimum wage in the state this Five Guys transaction occurred? If a food service employee is paid $30 or more per month in tips, the business paying the wages can pay as little as $2.13 an hour with a potential $5.12 an hour towards the overall minimum wage coming directly from customer tips.
The aggressive tipping mechanism is standard practice in food service businesses to direct 70% of employee wage costs to a separate revenue stream (tips) under federal tipped minimum wage law. Depending on each individual state’s minimum wage legislation, the tipped wage has a floor of $2.13 an hour, as set by the federal tipped minimum wage set in 1991 (yes, the federal tipped minimum wage has not changed in 31 years). This permits an employer to pay 70% of the $7.25 federal minimum wage out of tips rather than general revenues; this $5.12 an hour oftentimes is referred to as a “tip credit.”
In effect, Five Guys REALLY wants you to leave a large tip so their overpriced burgers can have even higher profit margins. If this is inducing heart palpitations exclusive to the artery-clogging grease, recall that the federal minimum wage has remained at $7.25 for 13 years and the federal tipped minimum wage has remained the same since Five Guys was only five years old and was restricted to the Washington D.C. area.
Your comments are almost invariably trashed these days due to the toxic combination of being brutally long and mind-numbingly idiotic. But this one was just too stupid to pass up. Only wait staff are exempt from minimum wage law, not all employees at places that sell food, and there are no wait staff at Five Guys, etc. All that effort to miss such an obvious boat is no way to go through life, Joseph.
The solution to this conundrum is Cow-tipping, Previously discussed here on SJ. If eating out, taking -out, Or taking- in is your modus operandi, well then, consider Cow-tipping. Not for the faint of heart or city slickers. (You know who you are, TikTok- breaths all of ya!).
A soon-to-be released NY Times best seller by yours truly. Try it, you might like. Easier during the full moon and slight NW wind. If the coyotes are howling, abort immediately. However, they are seldom dangerous to humanoids.