system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why are waiters/waitresses paid below minimum wage in the U.S.? Isn't a tip not a tip anymore when you're essentially paying their living wages and subsidizing the restaurant's payroll?
gpt
1. Servers used to be paid normal wages.
2. People gave them tips.
3. Restaurant owners noticed that the servers got roughly as much in tips as they did in wages. They saw a cost-cutting opportunity.
4. Restaurant owners successfully lobbied Congress to put in an exemption to the federal minimum wage law, citing that servers made plenty of money on tips alone.
5. And here we are.