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Should Canada dispense with its tipping culture?

Six UBC experts share their perspectives. Published in Alumni Digest as verified reporting from the University of British Columbia.

Six UBC experts share their perspectives.

Alumni Digest editorial deskMay 19, 20232 min read
In the September issue
Should Canada dispense with its tipping culture?
Yes, we should get rid of tipping in Canada. Tipping tends to be a feature of interactive service work in which the service worker interacts directly with the customer, granting a degree of supervisory power to the customer. This is useful in workplaces where the service provided cannot just be standardized and dictated to the worker but rather lies in the worker’s ability to respond to the individualized needs and wants of the customer. But most of us tip habitually, not in response to service quality, and tipping amplifies the power dynamic between customer and service worker, potentially introducing pressure for the worker to cater to unreasonable or demeaning expectations and/or to reinforce social inequalities that already structure social interactions (like biases associated with race, gender, age, or body size, for example). If tipping doesn’t actually do what it is supposed to do, workers should just be paid fully for their work, and managers – not customers – should assume responsibility for service quality. Chair in Business and Professional Ethics, Sauder School of Business; Director, W. Maurice Young Centre for Applied Ethics (SPPH) Photo: Reporting: Richard Littlemore. Source image retained for editorial review; rights clearance is still required before any broader reuse.

The context

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Six UBC experts share their perspectives.

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