I Don't Think Texas Frat Bros Should Be Sent Home For A 5% Tip

What you are looking at here is a screen cap from this week's Fort Worth Weekly's Last Call column.

In this week's Go Home, Frat Bros Last Call a bartender complains, at length, about a "pack of dude-bros celebrating their graduation" by buying over $100 of drinks whilst tipping 5% of whatever the total was.

That 5% had the bartender feeling deeply insulted.

The part of what the bartender had to say that I found interesting was....

"....maybe you have no idea about standard tipping practices in American bars, where a buck per drink or 15-20 percent of the total bill is pretty typical (and appreciated). Maybe you’re from Washington State, where the minimum wage for tipped employees is $9.32 an hour versus $2.13 virtually everywhere else. Maybe you’re from another country, where nobody tips anyone. Maybe you’re simply obtuse. I have no idea. But if nobody tells you, you’re likely to bop about your bar-going life unwittingly making enemies behind every bar in town. Don’t be that guy!"

I was a year or two into my Texas exile when I first learned that in Texas tipped waiter/waitress workers got paid a fraction of the minimum wage. I remember upon learning this wondering how such a thing is legal.

I doubt my old home state is the only place in America where $2.13 is not the going hourly wage for bartenders.

Is this $2.13 an hour a Texas only thing that this particular bartender erroneously thinks is standard across America, except for Washington?

It seems to me that when one buys a beer or a margarita in a bar one is already paying an inflated price for consuming such outside the comfort of ones domicile.

I don't remember the last time I bought something from a bartender.

I do remember soon upon being in Texas being intrigued by the now long gone Baby Doe's in Dallas. Then going to Baby Doe's to find myself paying around 5 bucks for one bottle of beer to sip whilst watching the light show emanating from the Reunion Tower.

After paying around 5 bucks for one bottle of beer it certainly never crossed my mind that the bartender who sold it to me expected a tip, or that he was paid a fraction of the minimum wage.

I have read there is a growing movement to put an end to the tipping practice in some locations in America. I assume Washington is one of those locations, along with other locations which are phasing in raising the minimum wage to $15.00.

Would the Last Call bartender prefer keeping the current compensation method or would he prefer being paid $15 an hour, with no tipping expected or allowed?