Dive Brief:

• The "tipping economy" remains alive and well in the United States, but there are many good arguments for why it should end -- with sexual harassment on the job at the top of the list, according to at Payscale.com.
• Because servers depend on a customer's generosity to build a decent paycheck (some servers earn $2.13 an hour depending on their state), their vulnerability to being sexually harassed is high.
• As the article notes, reporting on a survey from the Restaurant Opportunities Center United, the women's website Jezebel, found that "servers appear to report significantly more harassment (and a greater willingness to tolerate sexual harassment) in the 43 states using a tipped sub-minimum wage than in the seven states that don't."

Dive Insight

The article offers a few suggestions on how to phase out tipping as a compensation strategy. For one thing, employers and HR leaders in the restaurant and hospitality industry could move away from the lower tipped wage and instead institute the standard minimum wage or higher. Using a higher wage would go far in giving workers the confidence to speak up if they are harassed, the article notes.

Some restaurant owners report that taking tipping out of the equation has improved both service and food quality. For example, Jay Porter of the Linkery restaurant in California told Slate that this was "probably because our cooks were being paid more and didn't feel taken for granted …eliminating tips makes it easier to provide good service."

The article concludes that when employees are both appreciated and compensated fairly, their motivation and productivity is sure to improve.