Being a server.

So I work, and have worked for several years, as a server, or a waiter, or personal slave, or whatever you want to call it. It's a job I have made good money doing and I like to think I'm pretty good at. Of course if it were all that great I wouldn't bother writing this. I mean who takes the time to write a blog singing the praises of their job? Okay, maybe a professional blog writer, you got me there. Don't worry though, this also isn't going to be a bitch fest. There are plenty of those blogs out there. Think of this entry as more of a way to inform people. Even though I am just one guy writing a blog, I promise you, I speak for more people in my industry than you would think.
Where to start? I guess I'll start with the important part, money. As a server I have a unique relationship with the restaurant I work for. They pay me an extraordinarily low wage. Really low, I mean we're talking $2.38 an hour. Seriously. How can that be you ask, Ted Kennedy (r.i.p.) increased minimum wage to $7.25 right? Right, and good job on remembering that fact, Ted Kennedy did do some good things, but those laws don't apply to people working in the service industry in a tipped position. In fact once the tips I earn are figured into my weekly wage, I end up owing more taxes than I have been paid via my $2.38 an hour. Meaning I get checks that have no value, and end up owing taxes at the end of the year. Does that make sense? The government is assuming that people will tip me and therefor they don't feel the restaurant should have to pay us an actual wage.
This of course is great if people were still tipping like they once were. But they just aren't. More and more companies are using tipping less than 20% as a method of saving money. Oprah even suggested tipping less as a way to save money. Fucking Oprah said that, that's like Jesus saying don't eat pork. Shit runs deep.

Tipping should be viewed as paying for a service. You came into a restaurant, sat down, and a stranger got everything you wanted, had it made for you, and cleaned up after you. All you had to do was give them money for it. Think about that. That's some olde time king treatment shit. Every time you go out to eat. Think about it like this, let's say you needed a new muffler, now the muffler is let's say $200, but the labor to have them install that muffler for you is $150. You can't say to them, yeah I'll pay for the muffler, then when it's done I'll pay you what I want to for installing that muffler for me. Going out to eat is the same thing. The server is providing a service for you and you should pay for that service the same way you pay for the food.

Here's a really shitty example of the kind of thing that goes on in this industry. Some of you are sympathizing with the woman who wrote that. I agree it must be very hard to be a single mom. I know a few and they are some of the strongest people I know. However what is a single mom doing running up a $138 check on one meal? I mean is she really that sorry? I have my doubts.
Also I am sure some of you are asking the question, If it's so bad why don't you quit? Well consider this, if everyone who felt this way quit there would be a lot more buffet's out there. 
By the way, this is just the surface. I haven't even gotten into the way's that more and more restaurants take advantage of the wait staff. Or the ways they manipulate hours, or the lawsuits pending with some of the biggest chains in the restaurant business.
So I hope maybe this educated some of you.