Tips are barely a thing in the UK, and just not a thing at all in the part of it where I dwell. I've never tipped a single person in my life.

It's pretty standard to tip any person performing a service over here. For instance, waiters/waitresses are payed significantly less than minimum wage because they're supposed to make up the difference in tips.

Quote from Vorpal

It's the poor subsidizing the poor's income, under the thinly veiled facade of common courtesy.

Just another way we're manipulated by the wealthy.

not everything is some master plan designed to keep people down.

Quote from Arch-Angel

not everything is some master plan designed to keep people down.

I...agree? With this statement?

All I'm saying is the business owner gets to pocket all that money that we pay their employees. Not trying to frame it as some grand conspiracy, just calling an apple an apple.

They don't get to keep their tips. They do charge $2.50 just for ordering delivery when it literally doesn't cost the store Anything else to do it.

It depends the establishment what their tip policy is. Many places pool the tips and split it among select employees, usually the non-salary workers.

If they don't get enough tips to meet the minimum wage, does the employer add to the difference?

Quote from Smile

If they don't get enough tips to meet the minimum wage, does the employer add to the difference?

Yes, but, minimum wage for those employees is significantly less than most other employees. In other words their employer pays them very little hourly and the rest is entirely up to tips. So the business owners that would normally need to budget that large difference of money now don't need to and can instead use it on other things.
This means that when we tip the employees the money is functionally going into the business owners hands, not the workers, since the worker would ordinarily not need tips at all if this social construct didn't exist. If tips weren't expected they would have the same minimum wage as other entry level jobs. This also sucks for the consumer too, that now has to give an implied fee to an expecting worker.

This should be no surprise though, this is America.

Edit: sorry about that, I'm a retard.
TL;DR: Just because employers have to pay the difference doesn't mean they aren't usually paying delivery employees significantly less than their other employees.

So you're saying that the minimum wage is different for delivery boys and doesn't depend on the standard of living of the city where they're working in, but rather the "tipping culture"? Honestly that sounds like it's illegal (at least, I'm pretty sure it would be where I'm from).

The cost of living in America based on our minimum wage is fucked. Which is why I'm concerned about people wanting to raise the minimum wage rather than try to lower cost of living, though I'm not sure how they would go about doing that.

Quote from Arch-Angel

The cost of living in America based on our minimum wage is fucked. Which is why I'm concerned about people wanting to raise the minimum wage rather than try to lower cost of living, though I'm not sure how they would go about doing that.

Burn a wealthy mans money and raise the value of the dollar. Maybe that would get some results except someone would be going to jail and I'm pretty sure its more stock based than cash based

Go. Easy On Me Dude

Minimum wage is fine in most places and the majority of the US that doesn't have contending populations differentials. For instance, where I live, Washington state, it's a fucking nightmare. I used to live in a much smaller city above Seattle, and minimum wage made you essentially middle class and you were WELL off. After I moved here in Seattle, $13.00 an hour is still barely anything and you're still struggling pretty hard for money. You can't just raise minimum wage in states that have such huge differences between areas and assume it's going to be fine. Cost of living is a big factor, not minimum wage.

And that's why I get really annoyed when people just ask for higher minimum wage. It's not going to help. It's going to make the situation worse, because cities are going to struggle even more because businesses will just be forced to inflate the dollar (which is already a thing on it's own) and smaller towns will just continue to thrive because they're getting paid more off an already sustaining economy.

I think what California is doing by raising their own minimum wage is a good idea. Perhaps the federal government should keep a minimum wage in regulation that prevents harsh wages, but the states themselves are better off dictating their minimum wage based on cost of living.

@Arch I'm no economist, but I don't think it's possible to lower the cost of living. Rent depends on the value of the property, which is largely determined by the market. The reason why big cities like New York or Las Vegas have high cost of living is largely due to the amount of rent you need to pay. Considering just this, and not even including the cost of other basic commodities, I don't think it's possible.

@Externus I'm not sure what you mean by "businesses will just be forced to inflate the dollar"? If you mean increase their prices, then I don't think that would be a problem if setting minimum wage is set city-wide instead of state-wide. Higher minimum wage would merely decrease the income of already rich people (i.e. businessmen) but would increase the quality of life of poor people, while not affecting the places where the minimum wage is already optimized. Though I'm actually not quite sure how feasible imposing a city-wide minimum wage would be in the US, since I've got 0 knowledge on your labor laws.

That's what I'm saying, which is what puts us in a peculiar prediciment. I feel like it could be a solution to double the minimum wage and allow inflation to occur where it needs to where it's still possible to employ people at McDonald's without losing money. Mcdonalds is a good example of the results of inflation. They would have to adjust prices accordingly and probably go up to a two or three dollar menu rather than a single dollar menu. The point of increasing minimum wage is also to give more money to consumers that way they feel more comfortable spending which in turn can stimulate the economy. My parents are heavily involved in investment real estate, and I'm sure their cheapest property to rent is $900. That would be fucking impossible on $7.25/hr but it's like you said. Because of the monthly costs on the loan on the house they have to adjust rent accordingly in order to turn a profit.