Culture Corner | Tipping

Become a monthly subscriber for just $1.99 per month and receive an additional two to three episodes per week! https://app.redcircle.com/shows/9472af5c-8580-45e1-b0dd-ff211db08a90/exclusive-content In this episode of The A to Z English Podcast, Xochitl and Jack discuss the practice of tipping in American culture. Transcript: 00:00:01 Jack Welcome to the A-Z English podcast. My name is Jack and I'm here with my co-host social. And today we are in the culture corner and we're talking about tipping culture in America. 00:00:14 Jack And social, what do you think about the tipping culture in America? I just visited America, not just like a couple months ago. It's. 00:00:21 Xochitl Ohh, that must have been so hard for you cause Korea hasn't has no tipping culture. 00:00:26 Jack I know it's really. It hurts so much. We say this is gonna sound cringey, but we call it 00. 00:00:33 Jack See out of control. It's just. 00:00:37 Xochitl That was cringy. That's good. That was very good. But OK. The tipping culture is definitely inflated in the US, and it's for anything like any little service being a person who worked in the service industry. 00:00:39 Jack Yeah, yeah. 00:00:42 Jack That was just for you. That was just for you. 00:00:58 Xochitl Even recently I can say that I I appreciate when people would tip me even just a buck or. 00:01:03 Xochitl Something. 00:01:04 Xochitl But. 00:01:07 Xochitl It should be up to the corporations to deliver a working wage to the point that we don't have. 00:01:12 Xochitl To depend on. 00:01:13 Xochitl Tips. Because if you're working in the food service or whatever, even if you're not waiting tables, you might be making like $15.00 an hour and then the odd person might tip you a dollar for making their coffee or whatever that adds up substantially over the course of the month. And then you might make 100 or 200. 00:01:14 Jack Red. 00:01:31 Xochitl Extra dollars and that really helps, but at the bottom line, the company should be providing a wage where you can live off of that and $15.00 an hour doesn't really cut it anymore with how expensive things are in the US. 00:01:46 Jack And the companies with tipping, they're basically letting you pay the salary of the worker instead of them. It's like, not only are you buying the product, but you're also paying part of their salary. How stupid is that? I mean, it it to me, tipping is just I do it because it's a social. 00:01:53 Xochitl Yeah. 00:01:58 발표자 Right. 00:02:05 발표자 Oh. 00:02:07 Jack There's a social stigma against not doing it. If I don't tip, everybody looks at me like I'm cheap. 00:02:10 Xochitl Yeah, you're very. 00:02:14 Jack I'm a cheap guy, I'm a jerk and you know. 00:02:18 Xochitl You're like the male, Karen or whatever. 00:02:21 Jack A male Karen, you know, crying about tipping. But it we the fact that the the fact that the government pays those people so low because of tipping, they're they're allowed like the the the law in America there's a carve out for the minimum wage for. 00:02:41 Jack Like food workers, whereas they don't have to pay them as much as the minimum wage because they get tips. 00:02:51 Jack I mean, how stupid is that? That's like the restaurant Workers of America or something like that. This, this group. 00:02:56 Xochitl Yeah, anytime you're a server, uh, like a waitress. Specifically, they don't have. 00:03:01 Jack You make like $2.00 an hour or something. 00:03:03 Xochitl You can make like $2.00 an hour, and in fact they don't make $2.00 an hour because that's all taken by federal taxes or state tax federal taxes, I guess. So you end up having $0.00 on your paycheck. You're only making tips. 00:03:18 Jack Right. 00:03:18 Jack And and they can make a good living. They can make a decent living off of tips, but it just doesn't make sense. Why is why does the restaurant get to offload their the salaries of their of their servers on to you when you're already paying for the food and you're paying for the dessert an