The Patriot Post® · The Rising Problem of Tipflation

It used to be that tips were considered a reward, a little extra something that patrons gave workers who provided them with exemplary service. Traditionally, this concept was confined mostly to waiters and waitresses in restaurants, taxicab drivers, and domestic laborers. Anyone could tip any worker they wanted, but who to tip and how much to tip was at the discretion of the tipper.

Those days appear to be over.

Like most things in our post-COVID, woke world, the concept of the gratuity is being redefined. We’re all experiencing it. You go into a restaurant, and you’re asked not if you want to leave a gratuity but how much. And it’s not just the traditional tip-worthy venues like sit-down restaurants. Now, take-out food joints, retail establishments, and even the local Home Depot are all asking customers to pitch in some extra cash on top of their bill.

There are several reasons why this tipflation is now a real problem for consumers. The first culprit is probably COVID. When everything went remote and delivery-only at the start of the pandemic, tipping became a way of showing support for struggling establishments. People virtuously plunked down larger percentages on top of their bill because the extra money sometimes meant the difference between a small business staying open with employees or going under without them.

That extra cash was only meant to get these businesses through the emergency, through the tough times. Yet times today are still tough economically, despite what the Biden administration would have us believe, and some workers and businesses have come to expect that extra money as a means of income instead of reward.

Another factor in tipflation is technology that has allowed discretionary tipping to slip out of the hands of the customer and instead allow the establishment to call the shots. We’ve all seen the new touchscreen checkout systems used at many restaurants and retail services. The interface is generally the same, with four preprogrammed tip amounts that may range from 18% up to 30%. There is also a long bar below that where you can customize your tip. And the “no tip” option is usually the really teeny, tiny button at the bottom of the screen.

Social pressure is also a factor. Electronic tip prompts, tip jars, and posted signs with reminders that range from courteous to snarky all play a factor in shaming people to leave their servers a hefty tip that might not have been earned. A widely viewed TikTok video from September captured an incident in which a woman and her friends were refused service at a restaurant when their history of leaving tips didn’t meet the newly minted 15% baseline. Yes, the standard minimum tip used to be 12.5%. That’s history, too.

Bon Appétit, the widely read cuisine magazine, advanced the view that we should stop talking and start tipping. In an obvious appeal to its subscriber base, the magazine notes that workers in the restaurant business make low wages, and sometimes not even minimum wage. Tips are thus necessary to bolster their income. This has always been the case, but what’s taking place now is not rewarding workers for good service; it’s shaming customers into subsidizing all manner of businesses that are struggling because of reasons outside of patrons’ control.

Tip fatigue is now becoming a real factor for customers. Tips in general have begun to decrease even as requested tip amounts are higher than ever. Restaurant patrons and retail customers have come to realize that they are not responsible for bridging the gap between what service workers make and what they need.

Times are tough for everyone, and helping a business and its employees out of an economic jam should be a reward for good service. It shouldn’t be an entitlement.