Gratuity Porn
Can generosity be wrong?
The WaPo feature “At breakfast, this group always leaves at least a $1,000 tip” was surely intended to be a feel-good story. The upshot, a 63-year-old attorney started a “breakfast club” in which each participant brings a $100 bill that they pool to present to their server.
Ostensibly, it’s a sweet idea.
Groups that leave large tips for servers have become more popular since the covid-19 pandemic, with 100 Dollar Dinner Clubs taking off in places such as Wyoming and Utah.
Brooks said the idea is long overdue.
While he was attending law school in his 20s, he said he worked as a waiter on campus at Boston University for five years to help pay his bills.
“I’ll never forget the first time I got a tip that was worth anything,” Brooks said. “Somebody gave me $20, and it just made my day.”
And it’s certainly well-received by the recipients.
Roberto Rivas teaches Spanish full-time at a local high school, and on weekends, he waits tables at two restaurants, including an IHOP, so he can pay his bills.
Rivas had just finished serving pancakes and eggs to a party of 16 on a busy Saturday morning in Norwood, Mass., when one of the customers at the table called him over.
“We have something for you,” the customer, Richard Brooks, told Rivas. “The only reason we came to breakfast today was to give you this tip.”
Brooks pulled out a pile of $100 bills and counted them into Rivas’s hand, explaining that he and his friends were members of the $1,000 Breakfast Club. Each person had contributed $100 to leave for the server, $1,600 in all.
Rivas, 29, said he almost burst into tears that Saturday morning in June.
And, yet, the story bothered the hell out of me. And I think it was because of this:
“For years, I’ve given out single $100 bills to people at random in appreciation for a job well done, or just to brighten their day,” said Richard Brooks, 63, a lawyer who works in Boston. “More than anything, I’ve enjoyed watching the look on their faces as I hand them the money.”
[…]
In January, he decided to post on Facebook:
“I want to start a group to go to breakfast, 10 of us, and we each bring $100 to tip the waiter,” Brooks wrote.
“The Thousand Dollar Breakfast Club. Anyone can go,” he continued. “We will find a small place where the server will be shocked to get $1,000. It will be a fun quick morning breakfast and will blow the mind of the server!”
[…]
When he thanked the server and handed her $1,300, “the look of surprise on her face and the happy look on everyone’s face at the table told me we were on the right track,” Brooks said. “It’s a great pleasure to give money to people you don’t know.”
He said group members decided they would continue to visit a different IHOP every few months in the greater Boston area and ask that a single server be assigned to their table at random so the money would have a greater impact.
“A thousand-plus dollars is a lot of money, but it doesn’t go as far if a bunch of people are sharing it,” Brooks said. “By giving it all to one person, you’re doing something that could make a difference in their life.”
And especially this:
On the group’s third outing together, the giant tip recipient was Tulio Maldonado, a waiter at an IHOP in Saugus, Mass. Brooks counted out $1,300 and handed it to him on Sept. 23 while his reaction was captured by Boston’s WCVB Channel 5. Paris had contacted the TV station, thinking that the group’s story might inspire others to do something similar, Brooks said.
There’s just something unsettling to me about people for whom $100 is literally pocket change finding poor people and “surprising” them with a wad of cash “to see the look on their faces.” That strikes me as exploitation more than charity.
Then again, the whole tipping custom is problematic, in ways indirectly illustrated by this story. I’m reminded of a decade-old article in Pacific Standard answering the question, “Why Don’t We Tip Flight Attendants?“
When the airline industry first tried to go commercial after World War I, it needed to convince skeptical customers that air travel was safe. One strategy was to make passengers feel that the entire crew was able and willing to see to their safety. This included the stewards, the all-male precursors to the stewardess.
But which men to hire?
The default employee should have been an African American. Ocean liners and train cars, air travel’s main competitors and the model on which they built their business, largely employed black porters and stewards. But the airlines believed that the overwhelmingly White passengers would not have felt comfortable placing their lives in the hands of black men. So they hired white men instead.
[…]
If stewards were so capable and appreciated, why not offer one’s appreciation in cash? The answer is, in short, because tips were for black people. Black porters on trains and boats were tipped as a matter of course, but, according to Barry, tipping a white person at the time would have been equivalent to an insult. A journalist, writing in 1902, captured the thinking of the time when he expressed shock and dismay that “any native-born American could consent” to accepting a tip. ”Tips go with servility,” he said. Accepting one was equivalent to affirming “I am less than you.”
While ostensibly an act of tremendous generosity, a $1000 tip amplifies that disparity. It says, “This is nothing to me but life-changing for you.”
Again: I don’t think Brooks and his cohorts mean it that way. And I’m sure the recipients of the money are thrilled to have it. But the whole thing makes me queasy.
The restaurant industry lobby is overjoyed.
Same.
Also if that’s truly pocket change, then it would be great to see some (or an equal amount, since they apparently have it to spare) of money going to community-based organizations without any restrictions on how it’s being spent. Just $1200 a year goes a long way for a small organization and the majority of that money will go straight to helping the community.
Doing this is fine.
Doing it for the attention is not.
Acts of kindness are important and necessary, but they cease to be true acts of kindness when they are being done for what amounts to publicity, PR, and/or personal gratification.
That’s weird and gross.
One wonders how these people giving generous tips feel about increasing the minimum wage to something approaching a living wage, paying a fair share of taxes, paid sick leave, and many other measures that would go a much longer way in improving the lives of people waiting tables, as well as many others, sustainably and for a long time.
@mattbernius:
I understand the point being made here, I really do. What is annoying is the publicity given to this Gratuity Squad. But that is as far as my ‘outrage’ goes. I mean, a person can do both – (1) extravagantly tip on occassion, and (2) make charitable contributions to vsrious community service organizations.
“Do good in secret” is kind of a lost ethos, isn’t it?
@al Ameda:
Completely agree. This is definitely a “why not both” situation.
@Kathy: What she said. Also ruminations on the ‘new gilded age’.
What’s wrong with this picture?
(And no, the answer isn’t that some member(s) of the lesser riche has become queasy about the arrogance of leaving a $1600 tip to look at the reaction of the recipient.)
Not exactly the article that I expected.
… darn it.
I’m a big tipper. Former waiters tend to be. And when I was a waiter I vowed that if I should ever make it big I wouldn’t forget ‘my people.’ Left a $350 tip last week at Gordon Ramsay steak.* My minimum for a DoorDash delivery is $15, even if it’s just a sandwich. And I do occasionally drop an extravagant c-note on a coffee shop waitress.
But you leave the tip and walk away, you don’t stand around hoping they’ll grovel, FFS, because then you’re a dick. Job well done: no ass-kissing required or accepted.
*My daughter wanted to go and it was my wife’s birthday. It was okay, not amazing, but okay.
One place where I used to leave a gratuity was the Tip Top Tap. Cobden, Illinois.
They closed down after I quit drinking.
“But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. And your Father who sees in secret will reward you” (Matthew 6:3-4 ESV).
Sounds like Effective Altruism. Which is to say, not very effective, except at making the donor feel good.
I’m going to speak for the givers on this one.*
First, I want to note this:
You appear to have misquoted them. And in an important way. You make it sound like they gave money, not out of goodness, but out of manipulation (or as you put it, “exploitation”).
That is not what they said, at least as quoted in the article. Rather, what they said was:
Now, I can’t crawl inside their head to discern their “true” motives, but this strikes me as more goodness than exploitation. When I do something good for someone else, I too take pleasure in seeing their (presumably positive) reaction. I suspect others do as well.
Lots of commentary about the publicity of it all. With suggestions that they should do this quietly, not in public. I totally get this sentiment. I often share it. And upon closer inspection, I’ve come to question it.
Do we really not want media stories on these types of things? What about other forms of philanthropy / charity — do we find media stories on them so unseemly? Do we prefer the status quo wherein most media stories are about people being shitty to one another?
I guess I’m just thinking of the upsides of spreading the good(ness) word on such deeds. (h/t to David Byrne). Someone might join the dinner / breakfast club movement. Start their own. Do something kind later today after having read this story. And/or just enjoyed a brief flicker of hope and positivity.
We are social and mimetic animals. Let’s leverage that. I want philanthropy / charity like this to be broadcast widely…to catch on, infect others, etc. More this, less cynicism.
*I’m aware of the arrogance of presumption here.
@gVOR10:
Perhaps I’m misunderstanding you. But this strikes me as the opposite of EA.
EA explicitly seeks to deemphasize the “do it for the feels” aspect. And to emphasize the raw utilitarian calculus.
Note, Effective Altruism != Effective Altruists.
I’m not going to complain about anybody trying to help out, nor do I want to complain about doing something positive that also makes the giver feel good. It’s alright to feel good!
That said, it’d be against my personal nature to accept too much attention. I try to do my small part by delivering Meals on Wheels, and the recipients are often very thankful. It feels good to be appreciated, but that’s between me and them. If I made a big to-do out of it in front of a whole restaurant (or TV crew!), I’d feel that queasiness that Dr Joyner described.
But to everybody’s points that there are more effective ways to even out society’s privilege imbalance, yes let’s keep promoting those as well. And keep tipping on the high side until we fix that weird custom with proper benefits.
I’ve got no problem with the people doing the tipping. And if they take pleasure in it — well, don’t we all take pleasure in watching someone open a gift we gave them?
The real problem here is that some people have far too much money to throw around while others have almost nothing. And the reason for that is our nation’s insane decision to stop taxing rich people.
If you want to know where there’s a constant stream of items that are suddenly going for tens or thousands of dollars — from NFTs to bourbons — it’s because rich people have ridiculous amounts of available cash, because they have to use so little of it paying taxes. And that distorts our entire economy.
@wr: No no no it’s the poor people getting paid $15 an hour that is distorting the economy and causing inflation!!!!!
At least that’s what I keep seeing on the various news media owned by billionaires….
I’m a generous tipper for the same reason as Michael Reynolds; I have been on the other side. “I don’t believe in tipping; I believe in over tipping.” Thank you, Steve Martin. I’m in favor of raising the wages of servers, but won’t that lead to higher restaurant prices and price people less rich than me out of going to restaurants? Maybe having us richey-rich guys tip big is actually the best way.
@wr:
I don’t, actually. But that’s just a personal quirk, I’m seeing some sense in comments above suggesting that good feels encourage more good behavior. I just personally am extremely uncomfortable being praised. My wife and I made a decision early on never to take ourselves seriously as writers, to discount praise and remember who we are. When fans come up with tears in their eyes and our books tattooed on their arms and show us babies they named after characters, we of course appreciate them and to use the cliché, are humbled by it. But we also squirm and do our best to make it end quickly. It’s not good for you as a human being. Certainly not good for you as a writer.
I should have been born British – I’m good with piss-taking as a sign of acceptance. We do sarcasm, mockery, eye-rolling. . . we don’t do earnest. I blame Letterman.
But whatever we rich people do To Benefit Our Server, let’s definitely don’t demand politicians raise the wages of everyone so that every person who has that job has a decent life. Because haha familyblog them, right? Right??
I’m certainly not hypocritical. If I can’t randomly pick and choose at my personal whimsy who Should have a good day and who Shouldn’t.. based solely on which direction my sausage concierge tripped over the aston martin key fob earlier this morning.. what’s the point of being rich anyway?
As you should know by now, these acts of gratuitousness aren’t intended to quietly benefit the life of someone who needs it – don’t be silly.
Their purpose is to make me feel both grandiose and beneficent! Life is all about my precious feelings, for I am a Republican!
It’s tacky as hell, but in a world where so many want to kick the poor, I’m not going to condemn it. Sounds like they might be taking up the mantle of Mr. Beast at a middle class level, pooling their resources to do so, and… good for them.
Still tacky as hell, but good for them.
A lot of Americans really can’t afford to have a random moderate emergency, and now some waitress somewhere can have her transmission die. Or pay off the credit card debt she’s been carrying since her transmission died.
Unless of course that restaurant pools tips. Then N people can hopefully pay off a minor expense.
A similar thing occurs in the Philippines when Americanos (‘Kanos’) realise that a couple of bucks is a day’s pay for most Filipinos. Tip the kid who bangs on the window of your cab from the airport? Sure, why not? Tip the driver double the proper fare? Hey, he looked so grateful! Tip the waiters, the shop assistants, the bellboys, tip everyone! Scatter pesos wherever you go and you’ll feel like Croesus! They all love you! A nice change from the States, where you were decidedly poor!
Of course you leave havoc in your wake: businesses where the staff ignore ordinary customers any time a Kano enters the establishment; where the prices for Kanos are inflated 5-10-20 times over the price for Filipinos*; where nobody wants to work for value-creating businesses because they all want to work in service establishments so they can share Kano largesse; where non-American foreigners** get abused and ignored if they decline to shower tips on the locals.
Tipping, a practice totally unknown in Asia until the bloody yanks arrived, is an atrocity.
*One time I liked the look of a large cleaver in the Malabon markets. I asked my Filipino partner to go ask the price. 700 pesos was the answer. A few minutes later I approached the stall, and asked the price of the cleaver. “8,000 pesos po!” was the reply. We got a very sour look when he saw us meet up later.
**All white foreigners are Kanos to most Filipinos.
As someone who spent a lot of years working in restaurants, bars and clubs, I think the idea of waiting around to see how someone reacts to any tip, good, bad or great, is strange.
I saw a lot of people over the years who were anxious to let everyone know how much money that had. It was never a good look.
I also knew people who were seriously wealthy, and sometimes famous to boot, who did not seek attention and just wanted to have a pleasant night out. A much better look.
And if anyone is thinking that a $1000 tip is life changing, think again. It’s not even two weeks rent on a mediocre apartment out my way.
It is strange that tipping should exist in an allegedly classless society.
But even as a well paid architect I have had clients use their market leverage as a large homebuilder to treat me like a servant, and threaten to withhold payment on contract already months overdue if they weren’t satisfied.
I formed a response:
“Dear Sir- I would like to propose to you that I move into one of your houses and live there for several months, rent-free; And after a period of some months, we meet and discuss how happy I am with the hone, and allow me to propose a price to you which I deem fair.”
I never sent this, because in fact I WAS a peon compared to them and they could have made my life very unpleasant if I didn’t go along.
I didn’t like it, and I doubt any waitress, cabin steward or other service person likes it either.