so here's my "no stupid questions": How on god's green earth could you possibly afford tipping a barber 20%? Are american barbers dirt cheap or do you just actually consider it perfectly reasonable to pay closer to 100 bucks for someone to trim your hair?
this post was submitted on 29 Jul 2026
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No Stupid Questions
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...a haircut/trim is $80 where you live?
It's under $30 where I live, and some places are cheaper.
I checked the places near me and yeah a normal-ass haircut STARTS at $50, many places get very close to literally charging 80 bucks for a standard haircut.
0% because my barber is an asshole. (I shave my own head in the shower)
But how do you contort your body enough to hold the razor between your butt cheeks like that?
Practice.
Same here.
Electric or bladed razor?
I'm so glad I don't live in the US no more...
Where I live now in Europe, people earn a salary that allows them to live a decent life. And if you try to tip em, they get offended because you assume they're poor and they don't make enough money.
It's the US, they are poor.
Nobody gets offended by tips here because if you’re working for tips you are poor.
It’s pretty awful that all of the service people make shit wage, but if they’d just band together and unionize things would get better. Assholes in corporate America can’t show up without a good haircut. Barbers should strike for a month and see what that does to their wages.
I have yet to meet a poor barber. I see them generating over $200 an hour in a cash business. Mine talks about his new house, his Vegas vacations and he's barely 30.
My barber has to do Uber on the side. He sold his shop and now works there for the new owner until his other barber gig grows. He's a refugee from Mosul and a really great guy, but he's not getting enough from the barbering.
Having to sell your shop to someone else and then work for them must suck.
Being a refugee from Mossul in Trump's fashland must suck even worse.
Someone should write a book about a wealthy barber. :)
I know. But they allow themselves to be poor: they consistently vote against their own interests and they don't unionize.
Wow… are you saying tipping sucks? I didn’t know that! Thank you for providing such an original response instead of a useful answer!
The hidden answer was: don't tip. When nobody tips, workers will finally ask livable wages from their employers instead of relying on semi-compulsory handouts.
I see your point, but a change like that would require major legal changes, which would take years. In the meantime, I don’t want to screw people who rely on tips to live.
Yes I understand your dilemma. The problem is, everybody thinks the same way and the beat goes on: the employers don't pay their employees the true price of their labor because they know the patrons will make up the difference.
The system is allowed to continue by shaming customers into paying, and I'm not doing shame-based scams.
Incidentally: you know who makes a killing out of the Americans' stupid habits of tipping? The French.
In France, the gratuity is included in the price. But most Americans don't know that and tip them - meaning they get double the money.
That's why, whenever I go to France, I speak my native tongue in restaurants instead of speaking French - which I speak also: the waiter treats us real good all evening long because they think they're gonna milk a good load of money out of us. But when I pull out my credit card from a European bank, they instantly stop being nice 🙂
Fuck tipping, regardless of the country.
What I got out of your anecdote is that waiters in France provide better service if they think that will earn them a tip.
Fuck tipping, regardless of the country.
Agreed!
workers will finally ask for livable wages from their employers
Most states allow booth renting, which means that the barber or stylist is paying the salon/shop owner for the privilege of working there. They can be expected to help keep the place clean, only sell products the shop owner authorizes, be available for walk-ins a certain number of hours per week, and keep pricing in line with that shop's policies, but otherwise they're "their own boss." Whatever that means at that point.
So many barbers and stylists are not making wages. They've effectively got a landlord who sets their prices for them. The only power they have is to change shops and hope for a less abusive landlord, but that also risks alienating reliable and repeating customers.
It's an absolutely fucked and predatory system. It requires a legislative fix, but just like the other big tip-dependent sector of food service, the people in these jobs are overwhelmingly overworked women struggling to make ends meet. Many people find it difficult to engage in political advocacy when they're struggling to survive.
Basically, I hate this "ask for livable wages" rhetoric because at-risk people have the hardest time self-advocating. Don't blame poor people for being poor. See that there's a problem and advocate on for them.
Don't forget that when you do this, you're deciding what issues that worker should be protesting.
They didn't agree to hunger strike for YOUR cause. Those are hard working people that rely on those tips because of the system that exists. Whether or not the system should work this way is debatable (for what it's worth, I agree that it shouldn't be this way) but for now, tipping IS part of the social contract, and not tipping a server doesn't make you an activist, it makes you an asshole.
This is specifically for servers, and gig workers (Uber drivers, delivery services) There are a lot of people I don't tip, because they aren't making half of minimum wage per hour. I don't often tip anyone other profession unless they've really gone above and beyond.
They can ask all they want, the laws allow them to do it, so you would need to change legislation first.
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But that wasn't his question.
20% is more than reasonable for a barber's tip. Unlike wait staff that don't make a living wage, barbers usually make a more fair wage and the tip is an honest "thanks for taking care of me" and not a "Here's some money so you don't starve".
Ha! I'll tell my barber he doesn't need to do Uber anymore, since his day job is paying so well. The guy works all day, sunrise to sunset.
my barbers commute in from 2 hours away, and bitch about bike lanes and progressives destroying the city because they they reduced the 8 parking spots in front of the shop to 4. the owner actively hates cyclists and harasses them.
but then again, so does my coffee shop and pretty much every business on that block. but they also have lgtb flags in their shop windows and those 'immigrants are welcome here', because they know it makes their customers feel good to patronize a progressive space.
i love it.
my barbers commute in from 2 hours away,
Why?!?
because they hate the city. but they like the money city people give them.
There are three major cities about two hours from me and I can't imagine having to drive to any of them more than once a month. Just seems like most of that extra money is spending itself on just the commute.
Super cool story.
25-30 but i like my barber.
i also stopped going and I cut my own hair now because paying $50-60 for a 10-15m haircut is just insane. most haircuts in my city start at 35-45 bucks now.
every 8 weeks and spend like $25
$35+ every 3 weeks here. I sublimate from Tidy to Schlub overnight on day 22.
I give a solid 25%, but my cuts generally take the better part of an hour, because I have thick and relatively curly hair; also I’ve known my barber for over a decade and she does reliably excellent work.
I go with 20% as well.
I refuse to participate in tip inflation. I tip 15% to all service employees. The only exception for me is tattoo artists, which get 25%
I tip 15% to all service employees.
My rule of thumb is to tip more to service workers that incur more personal expenses.
Restaurant workers? 10~15%. (They make at least minimum wage where I live just like takeout/fast food workers. I wish I could tip them 0% culturally)
Barbers/hairstylists? 15~20%.
Rideshare drivers get 20% minimum or more if it's a cheap fare.
Tbh I forgot about rideshare, because I don't use them. I refuse to feed those tech companies.
Cab drivers have been way too sketchy where I live for my entire life.
Rideshares let me call them through an app, track my ride by GPS, let me see the full fare (including all taxes and fees) up-front, and always let me make 100% of my payment by credit card without complaint from the driver.
If taxis offered that where I live, Uber would've been dead on arrival like it is in Korea.
Wait tattoos get tips? That's the one field where they can just charge any random number and people will continue to pay it if the results are good. I expect tattoo artists to be paid very well by the company they work for if it isn't themselves.
We're getting so far beyond just waiters making $2 an hour now. We're getting into people that are actually skilled getting skilled labor money.
Every tattoo parlor not owned directly by the artists are basically staffed by contractors. They pay the studio for their space and equipment, which means the cost of the tattoo has to somewhat cover these expenses.
They may be paid better overall, but their working conditions are pretty lousy. McDonald's might fire a worker trying to unionize, but they do at least have the right to organize. Tattoo artists are completely excluded from the NLRA, they have no labor protections at all.
- Barbers do no get tips. Hair stylists do get tipped though, all your big chains are stylists.
0% because everyone should have decent wages. Tips are a way for bosses to avoid properly paying their employees.
I always tip 25%.
"Customers should leave your purview with the hair on their head, and possibly face, styled, trimmed or even extended, as close to their preference as possible."
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