A couple weeks back, I wrote about tipping via screens: It's down across the board, percentage-wise, and I think the suckiness of the tipping prompts is at least partially to blame. One common strategy people employ to deal with the prompts is to ignore them, walking away from the counter when a screen asks whether they'd like to tip $1 or 25 percent or whatever, opting out of the transaction completely. You have likely walked up to a counter to buy a matcha latte only to see that the person on line ahead of you has abdicated this opportunity to tip. Maybe you even thought, I could leave a tip for them.
Speaking on CNBC Tuesday morning, McDonald's CEO Chris Kempczinski was asked how the fast-food chain would be affected by the "no tax on tips" provision of the Big Beautiful Bill, which President Donald Trump signed into law in July. Proponents of the change say that it will lower taxes for a variety of employees, including restaurant servers. At McDonald's, workers don't take tips, Kempczinski said, meaning that the chain's workers won't see a change.
In Europe, tipping is very different than it is in the U.S. Most waitstaff are paid a living wage to begin with, meaning that to them tips are what they are intended to be: a gift for exceptional service.