20%

Mr Penney,

In my case I let the manger know when I am not please with my service, and leave a short tip. I figure the server can put that together.

#27 -- That's right as long as your baseline in the US is 15%-20%. That is, as long as unexceptional service will get a 15%-20% tip. Service which is exceptionally bad deserves less and service which is exceptionally good deserves more.

But if you're thinking that the baseline is zero, and that only exceptionally good service deserves any tip at all, then you should either adjust your thinking and adapt to the customs of the country you're visiting or stay home.

In my case I let the manger know when I am not please with my service, and leave a short tip. I figure the server can put that together.

Yeah--same thing, really: the manager will doubtless pass it on to the server.

--M.

When Willysnout was around here more, he'd post to every tipping thread a list of all the possible responses, so that you can just pick your number and save a lot of typing.

In his absence, here's a substitute:

(1) Tipping is the custom in the USA, so just deal with it like you would any other custom--play along.
(2) I don't want to tip because I don't do it at home.
(3) I don't want to tip because I don't want to support a system where people in service industries aren't earning a minimum wage.
(4) Tipping improves the overall quality of service because it encourages servers to go above and beyond.
(5) Since the tip is mandatory, it doesn't actually work as an incentive.
(6) Tipping is a baffling system and I'd rather just opt out entirely. They'll understand since I'm not an American.
(7) Why can't the price just reflect the cost of the service?
(8) 15% is highway robbery! I just leave 10%.
(9) 10% is stingy and rude! I leave at least 18%.
(10) Waiters really work hard for those tips, so they deserve them.
(11) It's practically robbery not to tip, since waiters get taxed as if you leave a tip, whether you do or not.
(12) The service is better in countries where they don't tip.
(13) The service is worse in countries where they don't tip.
(14) The meals cost so much anyway! I can't afford to tip.
(15) If you can't afford to tip, you cant afford a sit-down restaurant. Eat at Mickey D's instead.

I miss Willy-not that your post wasn't Willyesque...just make me miss him more. sniff

Edited by: StanInMaryland

in the US, we get various payroll taxes deducted from our wages before we get paid. So the $2/hr. barely covered the taxes that were withheld from my wages

Is there not a tax threshold, below which you pay no income tax?

Here, I think it's about $25,000pa - which means if you made less than $500 in a week, you'd pay no income tax that week

Taking the advise of the person trying to get the tip is probably not the best measure of how much to tip

Yep - and that's why I created this OP

But by the responses to this thread it would appear that even Americans aren't in agreement on how much to tip

Considering the current strength of our dollar compared with the greenback, though, my approach on my upcoming visit will be to aim somewhere around 20% unless the service is so bad I feel the need to lecture them (which can also happen from time to time)

Income tax is separate from payroll tax. Income tax is slightly progressive, and there is a threshold below which you'll pay no income tax.

Payroll tax, which in theory goes to support social security and government medical insurance, such as there is here, hits the first dollar you earned, hits only earned income (not interest, dividends, capital gains, royalties, rents, etc) and cuts out entirely at about $100,000 of earned income. It's almost incredibly regressive.

The average American pays more in payroll tax than in income tax.

Shi-it!!!!

So, at a guess, ballpark figure, how much payroll tax would you pay on a weekly earning of $100? $500? $1000?

I'm starting to think I might tip the poor bastards more like 25%

It's set up so that in theory the employee pays 7.65% and the employer pays 7.65% (of everything up to $108,200). Pretty much all economists agree that if it didn't exist, the part that the employer pays would show up in additional compensation (it's a cost of employment to the employer) so that in effect it's all coming out of the employee's paycheck, although it doesn't look that way on the pay stub.

The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities figures that 75% of American workers pay more in payroll tax than in income tax. (That's assuming that the employee is paying for the share nominally paid by the employer.) When you hear people, by which I mean Republicans, talking about people who pay no tax, bear that in mind.