An ongoing hot topic that has been on many people’s minds nowadays would definitely include the proposal for increasing minimum wage in America. However, one group is going unnoticed and unrepresented in the debates. Since the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) was put into effect in 1938, it has become acceptable to require certain workers to work for tips. Waiters and waitresses make up the majority of this class of employees. The law states that “an employer of a tipped employee is only required to pay 2.13 an hour in direct wages of that plus the tips received equals at least the federal minimum wage, the employee retains all tips and the employee customarily and regularly receives more than $30 a month in tips” (“Fair Labor Standards Act Advisor”). Of course, this does not always work in the favor of the employee. However, there is substantial evidence that is in favor of giving tipped workers an actual, livable wage. In order to ensure that all workers in America are treated equally, waiters and waitresses in the United States should be paid the base minimum wage of seven dollars and twenty-five cents ($7.25) per hour.
To start off, it is commonly agreed upon that tipping at the end of a meal is often annoying and stressful. It is not required by law to tip anyone, but the guilt of social norms forces one to calculate what their server deserves. Someone cannot ever simply order something from a dine-in restaurant and pay for the price on the menu; it ends in a frustrating math calculation, which sours the mood at the end of what was possibly an enjoyable meal. However, while this is only an inconvenience for the paying customer, it is the difference between poverty and making ends meet for a server.
Statistically speaking,...
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...ability of the wages of tipped workers is unfair and should be illegal, considering that the laws that are meant to protect these employees are often violated. Violations do not only happen to waiters, because "in some regions, the Department of Labor itself has recorded Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) noncompliance levels at above 50 percent in the nursing home, poultry processing, daycare, and restaurant industries" (Fine). Overall, the noncompliance seems to be an epidemic, and something must be done to change it.
In the end, tipped workers, especially waiters and waitresses, are treated unfairly no matter how one looks at it. Our tip to you is: encourage restaurants to stop enforcing tips and start considering the livelihoods of their employees, who deserve the same wages as any other minimum wage worker (no matter what the federal minimum wage may become.)