Chicago became the largest U.S. city to independently phase out the subminimum wage for tipped workers on Friday, a step celebrity chef Rick Bayless said the city needed to take “for the greater good.”
Bayless supported the legislation, which passed by vote of 36-10, but not without reservations.
He worries it could deepen the pay disparity between well-paid front-of-house workers who will be getting raises and their counterparts in the kitchen, who have always taken home less money because they don’t collect tips.
And alarm raised by restaurant owners about the impact higher labor costs will have on their bottom lines and on menu prices is not just noise, said Bayless, whose Chicago restaurants include Frontera Grill and Topolobampo. “A lot of people look at (the) restaurant world and say, ‘Well just pay them more,’” Bayless said. “But it is a zero sum game.”
Still, the chef, who implemented a service fee in his full-service Chicago restaurants during summer 2020 and now pays servers at Frontera and Topolobampo at least $25 an hour, said the phaseout is necessary. While servers at high-end downtown restaurants can make a lucrative living off of tips, he said, many waitstaff at smaller neighborhood restaurants are just getting by.
“We have to ensure that everybody who’s waiting tables in all the restaurants, no matter whether they’re high-profile or your local diner,” he said, “that they’re being taken care of.”
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