Quote Originally Posted by PaulConventionWV View Post
No, the boss cannot pay according to performance. He/she can only pay for the performance he/she expects, but he/she cannot measure the customer's satisfaction or know the perception that the customer had of the wait staff's performance. The boss can pay for doing what they are paid to do, you know, run through the motions, but they cannot possibly come up with a price for how the customer feels about the wait staffer's performance. Only the customer can do that, but regardless, it is earned pay because it is pay for services rendered. This doesn't only include the consumed product, which is what the bill is for, but also for the promptness and friendliness of the wait staff. If the wait staff meets expectations or better, they get a generous tip because they earned it. What they did was WORTH something. If it were just a gift, it would not be worth anything. The reason there's no standard is because of the reasons I mentioned above: you can't have a standard and still allow the customer to decide what the services rendered was worth. If the choice is taken away, then that nullifies the whole purpose of tipping.

That's so funny that you are fine with expelicit rules, like the ones Congress passes all the time, and yet a free market-oriented service and payment does not earn your respect. Why is this, might I ask? What's so wrong with the implicit expectation that the employee's services are good enough to earn a tip? The ONLY reason we have tips is to provide a performance-oriented incentive for the employees, not as charity. It's a part of the job, not just some whim of good will you have occasionally.

I'm sure you do tip and that it's because you know it's expected of you because to not tip would be to imply that the wait staff's services were worthless. However, you like to hide your obligation to tip under the facade of altruism. Regardless, tips are payment for a service as I have clearly demonstrated because it is there for the specific reason of giving incentive, not just for generosity. If this is the case, why don't they do that at other jobs?
Why not leave a tip for the chefs too while you're at it? The food is far more important than who serves it. As long as a waiter is on time and get my order correct, I could care less about the service. Why not run a wait staff the way you run any other staff, and that is have the management responsible for motivating the wait staff. Why is it necessary for customers to manage the wait staff? Its not their job. When I go to a restaurant, I don't want the burden of managing someone's wait staff, thats their job, not mine.