A recent NPR story about tipping generated a lot of reactionfrom the audience. When I mentioned a letter we received to the reporter, Stacey Vanek Smith, she said she, too, had received a lot of audience feedback.
Why? Lots of reasons. Tipping is a universal experience in the United States. Many people have to make multiple decisions about tipping every week. Sure, there's the barista and the hairstylist. But also the person who pulls your beer at the baseball stadium and the person who rings you up at the bowling alley.
Tipping is a sentinel issue in the U.S. because it is integral to how we've implemented wage policies, structured the service economy and determined the prices for some goods. What seems like a small choice rooted in feedback or generosity is really a complicated network of decisions made by systems we can't even see most of the time.
So when Smith's recent story about what it feels like to be the person asking for a tip aired, people had thoughts on it.
Read on to see how two audience members interpreted the facts that were presented and wanted more information, as well as what we learned from the reporter.
We also spotlight a follow-up story to an NPR-Marshall Project investigation that prompted the Bureau of Prisons to shut down a prison unit. Building on that reporting, an accountability group is pushing the bureau to pursue criminal charges against the staff accused of abusing prisoners.
FROM THE INBOX
Here are a few quotes from the Public Editor's inbox that resonated with us. Letters are edited for length and clarity. You can share your questions and concerns with us through the NPR Contact page.
On tipping: One story isn't the whole story
Lindsay Walker wrote on July 17: This story["Got tipping rage? This barista reveals what it's like to be behind the tip screen"] ... was, I believe, aimed at getting consumers to tip more. The reason I believe this, in part, is because you failed to present a critical piece of accurate information. At one point in this story you say that service workers are often paid at sub-minimum wage rates (true) and that tipping often doesn't get workers up to the normal federal minimum wage (also true). What you failed to mention, and what I believe was probably intentional bias to make the reader feel a certain way about tipping, is that employers are legally mandated to make up the difference to ensure that employees, whose tips plus hourly wage do not add up to the normal federal minimum wage, are made whole. Employers must pay out the difference because no one is allowed to get paid under the normal federal minimum wage, even if you're a service worker. I'd like to know why this crucial fact was neglected in this article, and why it was made to sound that service workers somehow get paid less than the federal minimum wage. I'm not saying that I agree with the federal minimum wage, or that I don't agree with tipping. However, I feel that this story was not presented to the reader in an unbiased manner and I think that is unacceptable.
@_deanpurvis posted on July 17: If companies would actually pay their employees instead of taking advantage of them (and us), none of this would be a problem. But @NPR barely even mentions that part.
Asking customers for a tip has become more common across service sectors, particularly since the onset of the pandemic, and reporters have covered the trend. Planet Money correspondent Stacey Vanek Smith reported about "tip-flation" on All Things Considered in June and about why tipping has become so prominent for Planet Money in July. Her recent story focused on one barista's perspective.
Smith also talked to economist Sylvia Allegretto for the story, which aired on Morning Edition and had an accompanying digital report. "Allegretto points out that a lot of tipped workers across the U.S. (many in the food service industry) earn a subminimum wage ($2.13 per hour is the federal subminimum) with the idea that tips will get them up to the minimum wage, but that doesn't always happen," the digital piece reads. Allegretto works for the Center for Economic and Policy Research and has extensively researched the minimum wage, the subminimum wage and poverty. One of her studies is linked in the digital piece.
(For background: The federal minimum wage of $7.25 has a provision for employees who receive tips: Their base wage from the employer can be as low as $2.13 per hour, but, as the letter writer pointed out, the amount of tips plus their hourly wage must reach at least $7.25 per hour or the employer has to make up for it. This is what Allegretto says isn't well enforced.)
Although Allegretto's summary of the federal minimum wage provisions for tipped workers and what she sees as its flaws didn't make it into the Morning Edition edit, in both versions the economist notes that tips are a wage subsidy and not a "thank you" for good service.
We asked Smith about her reporting. She told us via email that Allegretto's research "found that although employers are legally required to make up any difference (essentially get their workers up to a minimum wage if tips don't), it doesn't always happen."
"Workers on tough shifts — Allegretto used the example of a waitress at a 24-hour diner working the graveyard shift — might fall well below a legal minimum wage, but might not say anything about this to their employer, hoping not to make trouble or to be a good soldier in the hopes of getting a better shift in the future," Smith wrote.
Allegretto also told her that some employers don't check to see if their employees actually made the wages they were supposed to with their tips.
An explanation of the workplace requirement to ensure that tipped employees make at least the federal minimum wage, as well as a nod to the research that demonstrates why this doesn't always happen, would have been useful for the audience and may have eliminated perceptions of bias.
Given that people have such a visceral reaction to the increasing pressure to tip, more context on the peculiarities of federal regulations can be educational.
In her response to us, Smith also addressed audience members who thought the piece glossed over what they feel is a system allowing employers to take advantage of both employees and customers by paying their workers low wages and asking consumers to make up the difference with large tips. She explained that the U.S. tipping system is unique, but that a higher base wage isn't as simple a solution as it may seem at face value.
"A big reliance on tipping means employers pay lower wages than they otherwise would ... that means companies can charge lower prices for their goods," Smith said. "As customers, we are very price sensitive and will gravitate toward whoever has the lowest listed price."
Tips are presented as a choice to consumers, Smith said, but to workers they're presented as a baked-in part of their wage.
"Employers allow this because they are trying to keep prices as low as possible (to attract us) while also trying to compete for workers (by offering more money)," she said. "It's not quite as simple as employers paying higher wages. We have to be willing to pay more for what we buy."
On Morning Edition, Smith acknowledged this, saying "there's a lot of pressure to keep prices low for increasingly frugal customers."
The barista Smith interviewed for her story shared that he is often in the awkward position of asking customers for a tip via screen as he checks them out, knowing it's not a reward but part of what he needs to make a living. It's an important and often forgotten perspective within the U.S. tipping system.
This is a case where a single story is not the only story about a complex issue that many of us can relate to. Smith did a good job weaving in context within the constraints of a short economic news piece that told the story of a low-wage worker. Specifically spelling out the federal minimum wage provision for tipped workers, and the economist's perspective about why its enforcement is limited, would've further informed readers and listeners. — Emily Barske Wood
SPOTLIGHT ON
The Public Editor spends a lot of time examining moments where NPR fell short. Yet we also learn a lot about NPR by looking at work that we find to be compelling and excellent journalism. Here we share a line or two about the pieces where NPR shines.
An NPR investigation makes a difference
After a May 2022 investigationby NPR's Joseph Shapiro and The Marshall Project's Christie Thompson, the Federal Bureau of Prisons earlier this year closed one of the country's deadliest prison units: the Special Management Unit at the Thomson penitentiary in Thomson, Illinois. Shapiro and Thompson continued to follow this story and, in July, reported on new findings from the Washington Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs. The group compiled the stories of more than 120 people who were incarcerated in the unit, and its findings echoed those of NPR and The Marshall Project. The group also cites the work of NPR and The Marshall Project in its endnotes. This report is a worthy follow-up to the investigation by NPR and The Marshall Project, as calls for accountability and justice increase. — Amaris Castillo
The Office of the Public Editor is a team. Editor Kayla Randall, reporters Amaris Castillo and Emily Barske Wood, and copy editor Merrill Perlman make this newsletter possible. Illustrations are by Carlos Carmonamedina. We are still reading all of your messages on Facebook, Twitter and from our inbox. As always, keep them coming.
Kelly McBride
NPR Public Editor
Chair, Craig Newmark Center for Ethics & Leadership at the Poynter Institute
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