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Comment by paul_milovanov | Hacker News Reader

"No longer"? this didn't exactly happen yesterday; and it's not limited to SF -- Mountain View or Palo Alto are exactly the same.

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Anecdata but now seems relevant after reading this. And this is from 2013/2014. I visited SV on business trips and was boarding in downtown San Jose for a week or two on each trip.

I was always surprised that the waiting staff would actually stand with me and engage in conversation while I queued up to be seated. Travelling from the U.K. I had never experienced this level of "niceness ?"

Later I was educated that they are basically only earning anything meaningful from the tips. The wages were puny and they were increasing their chances of getting relevant tips by being so nice.

Things have gotten worse I believe.

It's known as tipped wages [0] (or, sometimes waitress wages).

[0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tipped_wage

The State of California has the same minimum wage for both tipped and non-tipped jobs.

On a side note, were you as a European* stunned and horrified to see the featureless concrete urban sprawl that "Silicon Valley" actually was when you came for the first time?

* yes, yes, some people will contest classification of Brits as Europeans

Well, there's good and bad.

I only got to suffer the featureless sprawl during the commute. Whereas I loved the cubicle I got to camp in while I was in that office.

Here in the U.K. I have to suffer open plan offices and in the winter months, the beautiful architecture is as good as not there at all.

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