OPINION:
It’s bad enough America raised a generation of youth to expect trophies simply for the so-called achievement of participating — in so doing, fueling an entitlement culture.
Now we’ve got to add to this entitlement mindset by tipping service workers simply for the achievement of doing what they’re paid to do, anyway?
Enough.
Enough of this out-of-control tip culture.
You know tipping for service has moved into the realm of what-the-freak, dude, when self-checkout systems have been rigged to prompt for, that’s right, extra money.
“Self-checkout machines now ask customers to tip,” as the New York Post recently reported.
Tips are supposed to be what workers get for going above and beyond, not just for showing up. And certainly not for not even showing up; that is to say, for allowing a machine to perform the service in place of a human.
Just say no.
It’s time to start bringing that ‘just say no’ concept to the tipping tables.
“The increased awareness in recent years around working conditions and pay for service workers has likely impacted how some people feel about tipping,” Forbes wrote. “About a third (32%) of respondents reported tipping more now than before the Covid-19 pandemic.”
Yes, that’s nice. Yes, yes, in a perfect world, we all deserve more pay. But COVID has definitely played a part in making that mindset a part of popular culture, even when it’s, in fact, totally undeserved.
In response to the pandemic, government forced businesses to close and in so doing, incentivized employees, via taxpayer-funded stimulus dollars, to stay at home — and to keep on staying home even after COVID cleared.
Between federal hand-outs, called stimulus, and both enhanced and extended state unemployment benefits, service workers were handed a bit of a golden egg, and for months, nay years, after the pandemic passed the government-declared emergency phase, these workers still made more money staying home, staying off the job, staying away from work.
Desperate retailers, struggling restaurant owners, and other service sector employers fought to bring back their stay-at-home staffers by raising their hourly wages, and then, when that didn’t work, by raising wages even more. It’s ridiculous what unskilled, uneducated workers are paid these days. What used to be bare minimum pay for workforce introductory jobs, for interim and part-time slots and for supplementary pay positions — for teens, for retirees, for second- and third-job seekers — has now turned into near-competitive white-collar and skilled work pay.
The federal minimum wage may stand at $7.25 an hour, but in recent years, and at a furious rate since COVID, leftists rallying in states and localities have driven the start rate to $12 per hour, $15 per hour, even $20 per hour — all for the same positions that a few short years ago paid far less; and that truthfully, should pay far less.
Cashiering at McDonald’s was never meant to be a career to provide for self and family; it was meant to be a stepping stone to a career that did pay enough to provide for self and family.
But that concept of real work for real pay is long gone, burned on the ashes of Obamacare, when health care as a human right became health care as a taxpayer-funded human right. The new American worker is more entitled sloth, than bootstrap-pulling creator. If they put half the effort they put into crying for more hand-outs into actually building something of worth they could call their own, America’s economy would have enough steam to chug into the next century as a global leader. But they never stop demanding for more.
Blame Democrats.
Democrats, as a party, have been taken over by socialists and communists, and it’s these loud-mouth do-nothings who’ve pushed for pay that goes far beyond what’s rightly earned.
They carry signs outside state houses that blare messages like, “We are closed due to poverty wages,” and “Will work for fair wages!” — all as they push for a national minimum pay rate of $22 per hour, and once that’s achieved, wait for it, wait for it, $25 per hour; $29 per hour; $35 per hour. To infinity and beyond. Why go to college — why go to trade school — why study hard, dig in deep to learn a skill, or take entrepreneurial risks if menial work, mindless work and no-talent work pays just as much, if not more? Picket line forms on the left, folks.
Of course, once the skilled find out they’re paid about the same as the unskilled, it’s not long before the rates of pay for the skilled are necessarily adjusted upward — leading to more costs on employers; leading to higher prices for consumers; leading to more reasons for the unskilled to cry; leading to more demands for more pay, more pay, more pay; leading to — well, you get the picture. Where does the cycle end?
Hello, universal basic income.
Goodbye, great entrepreneurial spirit of America.
See ya later, self-sufficiency and self-reliance and self-support.
“Two-thirds of Americans now have a dim view of tipping,” CBS News reported in June, citing a Bankrate survey that showed consumers’ growing fatigue and frustration with non-stop tipping demands.
Well, yeah. This is not surprising.
Do something worth tipping and maybe that statistic will start to reverse.
In the meanwhile, it’s time for American consumers to push back and fight the entitlement tipping culture. Here’s the rule: No tips, unless service is above and beyond expected.
That’s not only good for business. That’s good for the entire country’s culture of work.
• Cheryl Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com or on Twitter, @ckchumley. Listen to her podcast “Bold and Blunt” by clicking HERE. And never miss her column; subscribe to her newsletter and podcast by clicking HERE. Her latest book, “Lockdown: The Socialist Plan To Take Away Your Freedom,” is available by clicking HERE or clicking HERE or CLICKING HERE.
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