A bartender from Austin, Texas, has ignited debate online after revealing just how little she was paid for 70 hours of work, and why she says customers should always tip their servers.
In a TikTok video, Aaliyah Cortez shared a breakdown of her paycheck from the sports bar where she had been working for a year. Her goal, she explained, was to shed light on the realities of service industry wages and the importance of tipping.
Cortez showed her followers her hourly pay rate: just $2.13 per hour, the minimum wage for tipped employees in Texas. At that rate, working 70 hours would earn her about $140 before taxes. But after federal taxes, Social Security, and Medicare were deducted, her take-home pay came to a shocking $9.28.
“So this is why you should always tip your bartenders and servers, anyone who waits on you or provides a service for you,” she said in the clip. “Of course, I got tips, but this is what I got for my hourly. This is why you tip.”
Speaking later to BuzzFeed, Cortez criticised the laws that allow employers to pay tipped workers far below the federal minimum wage.
“There are laws set up that allow tipped employees to be paid under the federal minimum wage, which makes us rely on the customer to pay our wages,” she explained. “It’s not right that we have to do this, but I wanted to shed some light on the issue and inform the public about the importance of tipping.”
She also pointed out the obvious: living off $2.13 an hour without tips would be impossible. Her income, and that of many in the service industry, depends almost entirely on customer generosity.
Her video struck a chord, sparking thousands of comments and reigniting the long-running conversation over tipping culture in the US.
Many viewers were quick to defend her. “Your bar is basically getting free labor,” one wrote. “That’s not OK.” Another added: “If you can’t leave a decent tip, just go to a fast-food place instead.”
Others, however, placed the blame on the system itself rather than customers. “This is why the US should be like every other developed nation and not have a tip culture,” one commenter argued. “Businesses should pay your wages. Tips shouldn’t be a thing.”
Some pushed back against the idea that tipping should be expected at all. “Tips are optional; always have been, always will be,” one critic wrote. “We pay our bill, that’s it.”
For Cortez, though, the takeaway was simple: until the law changes, tipping is not just a courtesy; for many workers, it’s the only way to make ends meet.