Shortly before opening, Casa Bonita’s new owners Matt Stone and Trey Parker decided to eliminate tipping and instead pay workers a flat wage of $30 per hour.
Now I could be wrong, but getting a an hourly wage as a restaurant worker is FAR better than relying on tips. I feel like either workers in this situation are too obsessed with tips or there’s huge context missing.
It's messed up that there are even exceptions to minimum wage. It also makes no sense where minimum wage is low that the kitchen staff can be on minimim wage while the wait staff are making much more on tips. You can have a restaurant with no waiters but you can't have a restaurant with no cooks.
The whole system as it exists seems designed to retroactively prop up a nonsense tradition.
The whole system has roots in the reconstruction era as a means of not paying emancipated slaves a wage. Instead they were in many cases only paid tips.