2nd Hypertext Proposal

Low Wage Life as a Waitress

For my second hypertext I am going to do it on the life of a Low Wage Waitress. There are many who have either been a waitress, currently a waitress, or going to end up with a job as a waitress. For many it’s just a job so you can make some extra money so that your parents are not paying for everything. A lot of the time a person thinks of a teenager or some one in college who works as a waitress, but for may it’s a way of life. Their job as a waitress is their only source of money to live off of which they barely survive off it. A waitress paycheck is not all what its cracked up to be. Just because they get tips does not mean that they get paid the minimum plus tips. A waitress’s employer is “not required to pay a “tipped employee”. …more than $2.13 an hour in direct wages.’ As long as her tips and hourly wage add up to minimum wage then the employer does not have to make up the difference (Ehrenreich 16). The other problem is that not all the tips go directly to the waitress, but is split with the busboys and bartenders (Ehrenreich 28). When it comes to tips most customers base it on the waitress attitude and how good of a server they are. If they were really good customers are willing to leave a larger tip then the usual 10% of the bill, but if they feel the waitress performance was not so good they might give them only the 10% or maybe even less. The amount of tips also depends on what time of the day a waitress work. If the crowd is of customers is not very busy, then the tips for the day will be lower then a busier day.

Not only am I going to talk about the wage of a waitress, but also the conditions of their work and the life style they live. A lot of waitress are not only working to make money for herself, but are also for her family. It might be hard for a single person to survive off the money of a waitress job, but for a family especially a single mother seems impossible but they some how do it. Also there are single mother who not only work as a waitress, but have a second or third job. I am also going to talk about the women who not only are waitress, but also have another job and may also be attending school.