Holiday Tipping: Strong as Ever, Christmas Spirit Winning Out Over Social Pressure

December 14, 2024 TruthUSA

Ever since the pandemic in 2020, the time-honored tradition of tipping for all kinds of services has become somewhat skewed, as many U.S. patrons feel the practice has become more of an obligation than a choice.

But if the spirit of the 2024 Christmas season is any indication, the “tipping by choice” tradition is not only going to be really hard to replace in the foreseeable future, it also might end up becoming stronger than it’s ever been, just overnight.

“We’ve seen a steady decline in the prevalence of tipping for year-round services in recent years (dining, haircuts, taxis/rideshares, etc.),” Ted Rossman, senior industry analyst with Bankrate.com, told The Epoch Times via email. “Yet holiday tipping has remained stable and even increased a bit by some measures.”

For example, in a June 2024 Bankrate.com Tipping Culture Survey of 2,445 people, 35 percent said tipping in the United States has gotten out of control.

Yet a 2024 holiday tipping survey of 2,403 people revealed that four in five intend to tip this holiday season just to say ‘thank you’ to people who provide regular vital services—such as housekeepers, childcare providers, teachers, and trash/recycling collectors.

“I suspect this is mostly due to the holiday spirit,” Rossman said. “The rest of the year, a lot of the time, people tip because it’s expected—or maybe it would be more accurate to say they often don’t tip even though it’s expected.”

Bankrate’s findings showed that despite the trend to holiday tipping, nearly three in five U.S. adults (59 percent) now have at least one negative view of tipping in general.

These views include pre-entered tip screens, such as offered at restaurants and coffee shops, and the prevalence of customer confusion over how much to tip for meals, provided services, and the type of establishment visited.

But the findings also claim that while many people grumble over a sense of obligation, it hasn’t really kept them from tipping.

“Tip prompts may be annoying, but they work,” Rossman said. “Starbucks says about half of its customers who pay with credit and debit cards leave a tip.”

On the other hand, Bankrate credit cards expert Katie Kelton pointed out in the two recent company articles that despite ongoing concerns since the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, more U.S. adults plan to tip by choice this holiday season than since polling began in 2021.

“Holiday tipping has remained stable and even increased a bit by some measures,” Rossman said.

“This is because of the holiday spirit and also because we tend to have more of an ongoing relationship with the service providers who receive holiday tips. The fact that they may be in our homes and/or interacting with our kids makes us more likely to want to tip them around the holidays.”

Tipping by choice has been in place since the Prohibition era (1920–33).

However, this time-honored and still-preferred way has come somewhat under fire in recent years due to servers wanting a guarantee, and customers firmly sticking to their freedom to tip or not to tip.

In a 2017 public online video, longtime Florida server Francesca Raffel urged customers to tip because “we all like to receive something for the effort we put for things.”

But Susan Cohen, president and CEO of South Carolina Restaurant & Lodging Association, said the tipping situation is no different now than when she worked as a server in the mid-1970s—except for the “tipflation” factor.

“You now see tip prompts pop up on payment screens,” Cohen told The Epoch Times via email. “I truly believe that is where you see and hear pushback.”

And Rossman hinted that the trend to tip generously during holidays doesn’t carry through the rest of the year because of unreasonable social pressure, and, a tendency by businesses that rely on tipping to hide higher food and service costs in tips.

“Tipping has become a hidden tax,” he said. “Many companies are hesitant to raise prices further, given all of the increases we’ve seen in recent years, but asking for tips can essentially be a way for them to raise prices without acting like they’re raising prices.”

What it all means now is the same thing that has been true since the 1920s: until a better and perhaps more standardized way of tipping is put in place, the practice will remain firmly in the hands of the consumer. Put another way: by letting the market continue to decide.

Just like the Christmas season itself.

“I believe there’s a bit of self-selection going on with our sample here,” Rossman said.

“We tip for different reasons—to be nice, to say thank you, because it’s expected, to get better service next time, and so on,” he said.

“Different motivations are more powerful at different times, and to different people. It’s a bit of glass half-full/glass half-empty. Holiday tipping has held up better than year-round tipping, but it’s treading water rather than surging ahead.”

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