Tipped workers lagging behind

Proposition B, November's initiative to raise the minimum wage for Missouri workers, has provoked its share of confusion in the past months.

The first question was whether cities were exempt from increasing the pay of their minimum-wage workforce to the $6.50 an hour the amendment required. Then came the debate over fire and police department overtime and whether 40 hours should be the threshold for overtime wages. A lawsuit by several cities challenging the law, which could cost millions of dollars and result in police and fire department layoffs or reorganization, was filed Jan. 23 in Cole County Circuit Court.

But another issue has been largely ignored. The question is how the minimum wage increase affects employees who depend on tips.

After Jan. 1, the U.S. Department of Labor posted an interpretation on its Web site listing the standards for tipped employees. It said Missouri employers were required to pay half the minimum wage ($3.25 per hour) in salary.

This interpretation would have raised the pay for many waiters and waitresses by $1 or more per hour.

But in February, the DOL changed its interpretation and said "total compensation for tipped employees must total at least $6.50 per hour."

This means if a waiter makes $1 in salary and $5.50 in tips, the employer is fulfilling the letter of the law.

For its part, the Missouri Division of Labor Standards said that all employers subject to the federal Fair Labor Standards Act must pay employees at least $2.13 per hour.

Employers are required to only "make up the difference" if a tipped employee does not make $6.50 per hour including tips, the DLS said.

Missouri statute does not clear up the matter. It says no employer of a tipped employee "is required to pay wages in excess of 50 percent of the minimum wage rate."

Employers aren't required to pay more, but are they allowed to pay less?

The issue is not a clear one, but area waiters and waitresses are not clamoring for a change.

Paige Rodgers, a college student, makes $2.13 per hour in salary waiting tables at Broussard's on Main Street. She said a $1 per hour raise wouldn't affect her much.

"With tips, I make pretty good money," she said. "I probably make about $7 an hour in tips alone. So that's on an average night, not busy or not slow. So because I make decent money with my tips and stuff, I don't mind."

Rodgers said she would expect her employer to make up the difference if tips ever fell below meeting minimum wage.

"We should get paid a little more to make up for that."

Liz McCanless of Cape Girardeau said the minimum wage increase has had an impact on her tip money at Broussard's.

"I've noticed ever since it went through, I've seen our tips go down. They're raising prices everywhere -- it's not drastic, but you notice it," she said.

McCanless did not vote in the past election but worries the wage raise was too high. Employees like her who depend on the generosity of others could end up feeling the pinch, she said.

Another Broussard's waitress, Jenna Licare of Cape Girardeau, said she doesn't want the minimum wage for servers to rise.

"I make enough, even making two-something an hour," she said.

"You have your good days and your bad days. If we're busy then I end up doing pretty good. But it really depends."

tgreaney@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 245