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By Sara Soteras i Acosta
“Your job should be judged by your boss, not by a stranger,” says Adam Eidinger. After several years as a waiter, he begins to glimpse what many workers in the trade crave in the U.S.: the ability to not rely on tips.
The District of Columbia, home to the U.S. capital, Washington, D.C., could get rid of the country’s deep-rooted tipping culture after a referendum in which 74% of voters approved a minimum wage for waiters without the need for the extra money contributed by the customer.
However, the so-called Initiative 82, which has not yet come into force, has also caused a stir among restaurateurs, who see “no sense” in the proposal.
The measure will take effect on January 1, 2023, establishing a pay rate of $6 per hour for the first year and a gradual increase until reaching the minimum wage in 2027, although it must first be reviewed by the Legislative Assembly of the District of Columbia.
If implemented, this territory would join Alaska, California, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington State, where tipping is no longer standard.
After working in the restaurant industry and experiencing firsthand the ins and outs of the tipping system, Eidinger decided to advocate for workers’ rights and become one of the driving forces behind Initiative 82.
During his time as a waiter, Eidinger saw how the tipping system was “confusing” and gave rise to “wage theft,” as well as discrimination against women and “non-white” workers by receiving fewer tips than whites. “Your job should be judged by your boss, not by a stranger who judges you by the way you look,” Eidinger told EFE.
The initiative has been supported by groups such as Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC-DC), whose lead organizer, Sophie Miyoshi, believes it will allow employees to circumvent “harassment from some customers,” as well as reverse what she sees as the system’s main problem: the “extreme” difficulty in controlling where tip money ultimately goes.
In the age of digital transactions, the “majority of payments are made by credit card,” so workers receive their tips at the end of the month along with their paycheck, Miyoshi tells EFE: “There is little to no transparency against that.”
Some Washington restaurateurs have already campaigned for the bill to fail and the D.C. Board to repeal it as it did Initiative 77, a nearly identical predecessor to 82, in 2018.
However, the spokeswoman for Phil Mendelson, president of the District of Columbia Board, assures EFE that “he has no intention of repealing the initiative.”
There are also workers who are against it. The promoters of the proposal estimate that only 10% do not support it, something that ROC-DC blames on “misinformation” promoted by opposition pressure groups.
And the tip would not be eliminated, mainly because “it is very difficult to get rid of it” in the U.S. and still has a “good future” in the American system, predicts to EFE Michael Lynn, professor of Consumer Behavior and Marketing at Cornell University’s School of Management.
Owners have already warned that they will have to face the possibility that customers will choose to bring in less or no extra money, either by creating a service charge or by raising menu prices to keep their workers.
This is the case of the Taberna del Alabardero in D.C., whose manager, José Ramón Pereira, estimates that the implementation of this initiative, in his opinion “populist” and “senseless”, would mean 10% more expenses. For this reason, they are considering adding a 10% service fee to the bill.
The tips received by the waiters at this downtown restaurant represent 95% of their salary, so Pereira argues that “this type of business would be unviable” in the District of Columbia.
“In any restaurant in D.C. that is within the law, no one earns less than the minimum,” Pereira recalls, since the law currently states that if tips do not allow the worker to reach the minimum wage, the owner must make up the difference. “This is already covered, it makes no sense whatsoever,” he adds.
In contrast, the manager of Mi Casita restaurant, Alberto Vázquez, sees the initiative as an appropriate response to inflation, although he warns that adjacent states such as Maryland and Virginia are not governed by it and thinks that “most of the employees will look for work elsewhere”.
It’s not just a possibility, says Lynn, a former waiter: “Restaurants are having a hard time getting people back to work in them after the pandemic.
Lynn argues that the “guaranteed” wage, coupled with the long hours waiters have to perform, has forced them to look elsewhere and seek employment outside the restaurant industry, which has occurred “all over the United States” and casts doubt on whether this competitive restaurant model is really the one whose days are numbered.
