Opinion articles provide independent perspectives on key community issues, separate from our newsroom reporting.

Letters to the Editor

Letter: Customers should be encouraged to tip their servers

The article the Herald posted regarding tipping servers really brought out a majority of ill-informed consumers. As a former server, and I’ll assume all of the current ones, we thank you in advance.

Servers are paid an hourly wage. After taking our order, they ring it into a computer along with their individual employee ID number. Each sales dollar amount is totaled and then taxed at 8 percent (that was the IRS rate when I was a server), with the assumption by the IRS that as a tipped worker they are earning the additional amount from the customer.

Please correct me if I’m wrong, and hopefully encourage customers to tip their servers so they may pay for their higher education and someday not have to explain basic economics to people who look down on them for waiting tables.

Evelyn Gundersen, Richland

This story was originally published September 22, 2016 at 4:01 AM with the headline "Letter: Customers should be encouraged to tip their servers."

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