172 karma · joined August 8, 2026
My previous experience was any time something went wrong, no one would take accountability for it and at best I might get a partial refund but never a replacement order.
Having to do a bit more planning for meals is worth eliminating that aggravation from my life. Not to mention the shocking amount of money I'm saving.
We don't call HDTVs that anymore. We just call them TVs. Like what happened when Color TVs became the norm.
At some point a Self-Driving Car will just be a car.
At some point mentioning that a product includes AI will sound silly because it will just be a given.
At that point having ai inclusion be part of the products name will sound as outdated as saying Color TV.
This is already overstaffed and you are doing the math backwards. The place with 5 servers in the USA almost always has runners as well making total floor staff 8-10.
The comparison is not a mythical restaurant with 20 servers for 20 tables. In Europe a typical place with 20 tables will have 2-3 servers and no runners. We go from 8-10 floor staff down to 2-3.
Hopefully it is clear how 5 servers dedicated to 4 tables each and backed up by runners can do a lot more upselling than 2-3 staff doing team service. And they don't need to because their salary isn't dependent on it.
Locking down 1 server to a strict set of 4 tables is very inefficient as well especially when one section is slammed and another is half empty.
You will find plenty of study of tipped wages and restaurant economics but they generally don't use words like "overstaffed" instead they say things like analysis found that owners systematically offload slow day risk to tipped employees.
This doesn't change anything because the incentive is still to drive up the bill to drive up the tips. This is caused by the staff being primarily paid in tips.
> The chain restaurant could just "overstaff" with dedicated table runners with no need for a "full hands" rule.
Unlike servers, bussers and runners are generally paid minimum wage or close. Only over staffing servers helps make more income. Over staffing support staff runs up costs.
USA restaurant staffing is widely studied and your personal anecdotes don't change the conclusion: compared to most anywhere else, restaurants in the USA are over staffed with servers.
What you are noticing is that many chains have a "full hands" rule: if any server with free hands walks past a table with dirty dishes on the way to the kitchen, they are expected to pick them up no mater who's section it is. Also, if they are heading out from the kitchen with free hands they are expected to run out some dishes no matter what table they are for.
Repeat business is rewarded like in most places. I frequent many cafes and restaurants where I'm recognized and treated like family even though I have never once tipped there.
Personally, I find the service in USA restaurants to be obnoxious, overly fake, and disruptive. I generally only go out to eat in Europe because I prefer a peaceful meal rather than a rushed one with a side of fake friendship.
The owner wants the maximum ratio of servers to customers possible. In the typical USA system, being paid primarily in tips means the server is highly incentivized to upsell the customer as much as possible and do everything they can to increase the total bill, and therefor increase their tip. Essentially a commissioned sales person but the customer pays the commission.
This is the least efficient way to run a restaurant with regard to staffing.
European restaurants typically use a team service model, which greatly reduces the number of staff needed. Every front of house worker can take orders, make and serve drinks, run food to tables, etc. Instead of checking on the customer every few minutes they rely on the customer to ask if you need something. There is no pressure to run up the bill or clear out quickly in this model.
The hallmark of the anti-intellectual is to attack your motivation instead of your evidence. This made it really clear to me that this is not a serious writer.