Delivery workers made $104M more in tips after NYC began enforcing new law

1. Stop raising minimum wage. It doesn't do what you think it does. And if hang around any politicians' backoffices anyway, you realize the only reason this is ever raised is to manipulate voter turnout. Not difficult, just difficult to explain since it deals with second and third order consequences.

2. Do not let employers include tips as part of meeting minimum wage law. If minimum wage is $8/hr, then employers must pay $8/hr. Wages are paid by employers. Tips are not paid by employers. Also not difficult.

3. No Taxes on tips, anywhere. These aren't wages, and are not subject to wage or payroll taxes. Also, not difficult.

And lastly, tips before services rendered are stupid. Everyone knows it and is confused by it. It's something that needs to go away, but that isn't something that should be regulated into existence.

Tips are currently serving several purposes in users' minds:

1. earned for great service

2. to make up for lower base pay (tipped min wage is lower in many US states)

3. to help employees who they feel aren't making enough

Now reasons #2 and #3 are no longer true because driers are now fairly (IMHO) compensated through the guaranteed wage. How many users actually know about this?

Sure more money is flowing into the drivers' pockets, but doesn't this just continue to muddle the usage of tips and ultimately cost the consumer more?

1. If "tips" in the US are "compulsory" because customers should make up for the poor wage the delivery people get paid, why is there still a compulsion for tipping now as the wages have been increased (and presumably is "fair")?

2. And if the wages are "fair" now, why should a customer be forced to tip when they are making an order, rather than after they have received the order and can determine if the worker deserved a tip for satisfactory or exemplary service?

I absolutely understand the need to regulate corporates to ensure that they didn't steal the tips or lower their workers' salary based on it. My questions pertain to consumer rights. The government has rightly addressed the needs of the workers and preserved their right to a "fair" wage. But how is regulation that forces customers to tip at checkout itself (even before one has experienced the service) fair to the customers? (And ofcourse, by asking for a tip before checkout, you are forcing customers to give tip because apparently delivery people can see if someone has tipped or not before accepting an order, and most delivery people do not accept orders without tips or tend to de-prioritise it). Democracy is meant to balance everyone's right. Instead of forcing corporates to pay a fair wage, the government has (yet again) transferred part of the burden to customers (this time directly, instead of indirectly through taxes) and even thinks this is something to brags about:

> ... show tips nearly doubled after the city started enforcing the law and were “proof” that the apps were wrong about New Yorkers’ willingness to tip delivery drivers ... New Yorkers are consumers, but we are workers too. We want to support our neighbors who bring meals, groceries, and medicine to our doors.

Yeah, right - if someone is forced to tip because the system is designed around tips, that's not good grace driving the customers to tip. I am left to believe that this was a deliberate concession made to the corporates because it is in their interest that delivery people earn more (as long as they don't have to pay for it). So while the government maybe did do a good job in balancing the rights of the corporates and the workers, it has ignored the rights of consumers and deliberately sacrificed it.