It’s closer to $3/hr before tips. If they don’t make minimum wage from tips and $3/hr the restaurant must supplement to at least minimum wage. That’s a lot to just make minimum wage.
Around here an average meal at a restaurant would be about $14 lunch and $18 dinner per person.
So to make the often promoted $15/hr wage, the server would need to clear $96 in tips over the base wage of $3/hr. At an average of 18% tips that would mean the ticket revenue would need to be $534 for the shift. @16 avg per person that is about 4 people per hour, or 1 or 2 tables per hour
If the restaurant is that slow, that the server is only serving 1 table per hour, well chances are the server needs to look for another job anyway because that place will not be in business very long.
This is also why alot of servers I know prefer the tipped model over a higher base wage, if a strait 15/hr wage was created with no tips, many servers would make LESS money then under the current system
Most of the people calling for a $15/hr base wage have a delusional belief they will make $15/hr PLUS tips... that is never going to happen
It almost does in Portland. Starting July 1st, it's $14 plus tips. There is no "tipped employee" minimum wage. It's the same for all. I think it will be $13 per hour in the rest of Oregon outside the metro area but there may be a third level for the most rural counties.
Don't mean to be too much of a jerk, but I may adjust my tipping downwards. I typically do closer to 20%.
This whole $2 thing is bullshit that’s carried forward if you’re the average HN reader in a coastal city. My friends who are waiters across a spectrum of restaurants (in a coastal city) probably make $50-60 an hour, and double that at the higher end places, for a job that yes, can be exhausting (but not exceptionally more so than many other low-skill jobs), and requires no specific training or degree.