Do you tip the person installing your internet/cable?

Publish date: 2024-05-08

[quote] well you played that the wrong way but still got rewarded.

R64 I suppose so, but by then I'd discovered something very interesting while driving that van:

Many people treat those in the service industry like shit, simply by virtue of their being in the service industry.

This was in 1991-2, during a recession, and many of my fellow drivers had college degrees and couldn't find work, or had been laid off. Yet, many of our passengers (not all) treated us rudely, barking orders at us, telling us to hurry up, insisting we stop where it wasn't legal to do so, so they wouldn't have to walk an extra ten feet, demanding we take their bags up the stairs to their homes and not offering a tip, etc. You'd be surprised how few people say 'please' or 'thank you'.

I was driving some arrogant asshole to the airport one night and he was so fucking condescending, telling me how important it was that he make his flight, and saying things like 'Bush will win re-election because people understand Clinton and the Democrats just want to give poor people free stuff'.

I picked up my copy of the Wall Street Journal and asked him if he'd read some particular article that morning regarding the election, disputing his point. He appeared quite stunned, not only that I was literate apparently, but that I'd be reading the Journal. I also somehow managed to drop into the conversation that I had a corporate job during the day.

His whole attitude changed. I was exactly the same person I'd been five minutes earlier, when he talked down to me, but suddenly, in his eyes, I was somehow now worthy of meaningful discussion.

So while I may have garnered more tips by playing the 'poor me, I've never been out of the county I was born in' card, some part of me wanted those people to see that, under that ugly blue sweater, we were people not unlike them.

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