I respect that. I guess my comment was a bit contradictory I can see that. Although I have never dealt a bbj for 100k I have dealt hhj for 2k and every time I got tipped I personally went to the table and thanked the player for it. Not a rule I must abide to by the room but I truly do appreciate it. Even if in my opinion it was a small tip. But my opinion does not and should not matter on the subject of what you decide to tip. Just like what color shirt you wear. I hope you get what I'm saying.

BTW a way of telling if a dealer truly appreciates your tip listen. If they mumbled thanks drops it and that's it or no thanks at all stiffem next time. If they look at you or call you by name and say thanks probly a genuine thank you. If you do play with miserable dealers that does make tipping harder even for me.

You were doing fine until the "federal government agrees with me" part.

Now you're claiming that we should tip because the government requires you to be tipped to receive your pittance (I thought is was more like $2.15 an hour for tipped employees? Good to hear that's not the case in FL) of an hourly wage?

In that case, you make a good argument to stop tipping altogether so that no dealer meets the threshold to be considered a tipped employee and your employers will have to pay you a fair wage.

That being said, I certainly like the, "government says you need to tip us so my employer doesn't break any labor laws" argument a lot better than "it's customary - get with the program" argument even if it's just as nonsensical.

Here's another one for you: I'm not taxed on my tokes. Therefore, giving dealers tips can be considered a tax-deductible contribution. Yeah, I think I like that best.

Now you're just determined to disagree with whatever I say, to the point where I don't know if you're even paying attention to what I say.

My point is that tipping a poker dealer is more than just the mere custom that you seem to think it is. And the fact that the federal govt acknowledges my tips as significant enough to grant an exception to minimum wage standards backs up my point. Put simply, I'm not a tipped employee just because of a custom. I'm also a tipped employee because Uncle Sam says I am. And I think that carries at least a little weight.

I fully acknowledge your right not to tip me as you see fit. I've already said that in my last post and now I'm saying it again.

And the 2.15 wage for tipped employees was raised a few years ago across the nation. I think, but I'm not certain, that the tipped minimum wage has gone up along with the non-tipped minimum wage. 2.15 was the standard for tipped employees when 5.15 was minimum wage. But I could be mistaken.

Now I don't know what I've just written that could possibly be construed as controversial or terribly opinionated. So I suppose you'll probably read something into it that isn't there and will do a quote and reply to make it look official.

I may be going out on a limb but here goes nothing. If the tipping stopped altogether therefore forcing casinos to pay a fair wage one or two things would happen. 1 the rake would become so high it would not be profitable to play( or discourage most players) or 2 they would close poker rooms and replace them with slots. Bleak future for both player and dealer.

I wrote about this a week ago. This seems like an appropriate time to mention this again. Australia and France are two countries where tipping dealers is either not allowed, discouraged, or merely uncommon.

In Australia, there is a $5 per hour time rake (per player) in addition to a 10% per hand rake that caps at $8.

In France the rake for low limit games is 5% and capped at 25 Euros (roughly $30).

If US players stop tipping dealers, the casinos will increase dealer wages. But if you think that will happen without a significant increase in rake, you severely underestimate the greed of US casinos.

Uncle Sam says you're a tipped employee because your job "customarily" receives $30 or more per month in tips. I'm really not sure why that means we should feel obligated to tip, or more importantly, why you deserve a tip.

What does this have to do with tipping thousands of dollars on a hand that, if not for an established outlier in random distribution, a dealer would have received $1-$5 and been happy to get that?

Dude says he makes $4.65; they'd probably pay $15-$17. That's an extra $12 an hour. That's $1.33 liability per player per hour. Let's make it an even $2. I'll take that.

And yes, casinos are greedy. After all, they pay their employees next to nothing and expect their customers to supplement their employees' salaries. Pretty perfect situation, but the squeaky wheel does get the grease.

You're getting very obstinate with the word deserve. I don't know how I can possibly prove or demonstrate to you why anyone deserves anything. You have granted me my base hourly rate, but I'm not sure why I deserve even that. What if I was making $500/hr from my employer? Would you still concede that I deserve that wage?

When did this become the BBJ Tipping Thread? I'm talking about tips. I've said before that my region doesn't even offer a BBJ to its players. I'm far more concerned with getting a buck after pushing a pot than I am with my brethren in other states getting $500 or $1000 or whatever when they deal quad Aces over quad Kings.

Great question do I deserve a tip. Do you deserve a paycheck I would say yes you worked for it. Do I deserve a tip I did work for it but I also make $4 an hour so I still made money right? Well I guess that's enough. So as soon as you are making $4 an hour we will end this discussion. However the majority of people disagree with you as a non tipper so they make my career worthwhile. So no I'm not looking for a higher wage than $4 hour as a "worthless dealer". But my question to you is why are you above paying for a service the rest of your peers gladly oblige to?

LOL. He's right -- NYCN, you aren't doing your position any favor, believe me.

Seriously, when I raised the issue several pages ago, I was of the opinion that yeah, when I hit a BBJ, I'll tip the dealer handsomely, just because that's what I do; I'm a good tipper, even though I know there's no logic behind that.

Now I'm not so sure. The sense of entitlement -- and threatening me with the label of "cheapskate" -- is definitely a turn off.

Yes of course. If you got $500/hr, yes you would deserve that wage. This is because your employer has agreed to pay you $500/hr and you worked under those conditions. That has no bearing on what I personally think the value of that job is worth to a casino, though, or how that should impact me as a player. Are you saying we should feel obligated to tip because you make a tiny wage and not $500/hr? Do you tip the Walmart greeter handing you a cart?


Of course you're not concerned about missing out on a $5K tip - your region doesn't offer BBJs. Does that mean you agree that a standard tip ($1-$5) is fine on a BBJ?

What is the question? Why dealers get tipped,why they deserve tips,or why tip more for bbj.

NYCNative,

If you were dealing on High Stakes Poker and shipping out a $225,000 pot would you expect the same $2,000 tip?

Personally I don't think I deserve $500/hr either. Even if my employer offered me that salary, I still wouldn't deserve it. I'd happily accept it, but I'd never think I deserved it for doing the same job I'm doing now. I also think there are plenty of other people who don't get deserve the wages they get. Underperforming athletes, CEO's of banks that need govt. bailouts, and many more.

I think I deserve a tip because it's part of my wages. I'm a tipped employee. It's part of what I signed up for. Realistically I understand that not every player is going to feel the same way, and I know that I signed up for that too. I'm not going to chase down every player who feels like tipping me is something that they're just not going to do.

When I push a player a pot and he throws me a buck or two, do I feel like I deserve that tip? Yes I do. I provide a service and I get paid for it. I'm on the clock earning my wage. And most players are happy to pay it for me. And I'm grateful when I get a tip from a player. And I tell them that I'm grateful by saying thank you to them.

Do I tip every employee who provides a service to me? No, of course not. Some people have jobs that are simply not tipped employees. I'm not trying to start a new trend of tipping every person who does some sort of service for another person. But I recognize the custom and I respect it. And I tip often and I tip well. And I was a good tipper long before I became a poker dealer. Not just in a poker room, but in restaurants, cabs, barber shops, etc.

Why do you keep coming back to the BBJ with me? Why does my opinion matter so much when I haven't been championing this cause?

Since you keep bringing it up, I'll share my opinion, fully aware that you'll disagree with me. But I won't try to justify it. I think that a tip of $1-$5 for a sizeable BBJ is despicable. If I dealt one and got a $5 tip, in my heart of hearts I would rather get no tip at all. The $5 is an insult. I think 5% is a good starting point for consideration. If that's too much and you are more comfortable paying 2 or 3% I'm fine with that too. And if it's a mega jackpot and even 2% works out to too large a sum for you to digest, $1000 is always okay by me. If I ever deal you a $500,000 jackpot and you give me a grand I promise not to call you a cheapskate. I promise not to even think it.

How much do you feel you are worth at your job? We know it's not $4.35/hr nor $500/hr. How much is it? Perhaps this will help us out with our objective. Let's start there.

Your posts are impossible to read when they are churned out in absurd run-on sentence form like this.

People are giving a bonus if they give hundreds for something they'd normally give $1 or $2 for.

Almost no one here is stating that it is "offensive" to tip, or anything like it.

This is actually pretty silly. This is a long thread with tons of different people posting in it, many of them dealers. Most have been reasonable and thankful for what they receive, there are way more players in this thread, on both sides of the fence, causing it to erupt, than there are dealers. It'd be a little out there to declare war on all dealers just because the last few pages happened to feature a couple that don't come off well.

This thread has deviated back to a normal tipping discussion, which is not what we've been arguing for the past few pages. Granted, I haven't read through all of somethingstickey's posts just because of poor grammar/not formatted well, but it seems that he keeps bringing up normal tokes too (sorry, I'm not attacking you).

I'm not against normal tokes, tipping is fine it is basically the same thing as paying a higher rake. I do think it is stupid that tips are largely based on how big a pot is rather than actual dealer performance, but whatever.

I'm against tipping massive sums for the BBJ though. Dealers don't expect to deal a bbj in order to make a livable wage but they do expect the players to give them thousands of dollars for some reason. If you want to win the lottery, you have to buy a ticket. I mean this would never happen, but if dealers were allowed to contribute their tokes into the bbj, then sure it would make a lot more sense to cut them in for a percentage (as does every other table share). But dealers- when you deal the bbj you don't do anything that you don't do normally. You don't lose money every day to the bbj, and you aren't anything more than a stranger to me. I'm sorry, but I'd rather share my winnings with people who genuinely care for me and who have helped me out in life, plus even some charity.

The sense of entitlement from some people in this thread, has really made me view dealers in a bad light, and it's unfortunate that NYC may even be expressing a minority opinion.

I think I'm worth a buck or two a hand plus a nice bonus every time something amazing, unexpected, and randomly wonderful happens.

All it takes is one dealer to suggest receiving any tip under any circumstance to be an insult to prevent me from tipping any more.

I fail to see what the size of the BBJ or even the pot in general has to do with how much someone should tip. The dealer does the same thing in either case.

I always factor in 6 hrs in the box per shift.

If you average less than that, it is because your management has over-hired and over-scheduled.

Same thing with assuming 5 shifts/week. I know a lot of places only give 4 shifts, but that is a Management decision and a worker's choice to work under those conditions.

Compensation for dealing cards in no way shape or form should ever be more than a median income and some may argue that is somewhat of a stretch. If a dealer has made $10+ on his down and I win a pot, I'd rather give the dollar away to someone who needs it more aka charity. The dealer can write the dollar off if they wish.

I don't understand how you can label something "despicable" or "insulting" without justifying it. I think you know it's not really justifiable by any decent logic.

Why does the fact that a player wins more mean you should get a bigger tip, when you're doing the same thing you do every hand?

What about when a player LOSES a lot of money on a hand? Do you deserve to be berated or cussed out by that player? When I see players do that, I think they're morons; don't you agree? If so, why does the logic work in one direction, but not the other?