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Comment by andr | Hacker News Reader

An interesting aspect of this is the social role of restaurants in the US and abroad. In the US pretty much every restaurant I've been to hands me the check right after I finish my last bite. Lingering in restaurants to socialize is not so much the norm. If you go to a very popular place, you and your party may end up spending more time in the line to get in than on your table. So the tradeoff between going to a restaurant just to eat and getting food delivered is fairly small.

In other countries (e.g., Mediterranean region), it is perfectly normal to linger for a couple of hours after finishing your dinner. The social experience is the point of the restaurant visit, the food and drinks are just a catalyst.

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As a counter point I frequently linger and chat at restaurants. They do often bring the check but don’t force you to leave immediately. None of my friends have ever been in a rush to leave either.

Waiters are judged by the promptness of their service and it’s less risky to bring you the check than make a wrong call and annoy a table that’s waiting. The better ones tend to leave you alone.

Believe me, they are dying to get you to leave. Restaurants and servers make their money by doing as many turnovers as they can in a night. If you’re blocking a table the whole night, that’s money they are losing, and they desperately want you to leave. They’re just trying to be polite and/or don’t want a bad Yelp review. When they give you the bill and say “no rush”, they’re lying.

Only once the restaurant is at capacity. If there's at least one other of your type of table open, then the restaurant loses zero marginal dollars by you being there (and arguably gains slightly by looking busy and more attractive).

I'm very conscious about leaving a full restaurant as soon as I'm done with my meal but that's maybe only 10% of my dining experiences ever. I'm perfectly happy to linger at a half full restaurant for as long as I want.

There is an etiquette here. We arrive such that by the time we are done traffic is tapering off.

If we came at 5 and stayed the whole night I would imagine we'd be shooed off at some point.

Go talk to anybody who has worked for tips - Waiters want as much turnover as possible. It's better to get two tips of 20% then one tip of 25%.

Of course, this doesn't apply when the restaurant is totally empty. Then, they'd rather you stay and keep ordering things to bump up their tips.

> In the US pretty much every restaurant I've been to hands me the check right after I finish my last bite.

Where in the US is this? In every place I've been to, and I've traveled across a good deal of the country, I often have to flag down a waiter/waitress to get the bill!

I loved all the "pay in advance" restaurants in Japan, or the ones where there is a call button I could press to ask for the bill.

I've spent plenty of time lingering at American restaurants, on a few memorable occasions I've stayed from 6 right up until closing time. Try to avoid doing that, and give an extra tip if I do!

The cost of a restaurant or bar is made up of three basic things: inputs, labour, and rent.

In San Francisco, rent will be the dominant term in that equation, followed closely by the need to pay employees enough to themselves be able to rent nearby.

In sleepier parts of the world, the food itself is the expensive bit, so it matters less if you have people hanging around for longer.

This isn't the reason at all.

Even in expensive Eurocities they don't rush you out the door. In the center of Amsterdam it's sometimes difficult to get a waiter's attention for the check - if you don't take the initiative you'll be there for an hour.

And in cheap American cities they also try to push you out the door.

This also depends on the type of the restaurant and what they are make money of. In Germany in most of the restaurant the money is made out off the drinks, while not really from the meal. That is the reason why they ask you, if you want more.

It's also one of the contributing reasons why restaurants in regions with such cultures are more expensive. Patrons who take up tables for longer means that fewer patrons can be served per service which means that overhead costs must be distributed among fewer patrons.

I think that's something considerably more local to your environment and circumstances than the whole US.

It's true. I've dined at a three star Michelein and even they've felt the pressure to turn the tables for more guests/profits. It was done very subtly with an invitation to visit take a tour of the entire restaurant and kitchen, then I ended up at the bar and lounge with my party afterwords. It was all fine, but I'd have preferred sitting at the table.

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