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In effort of full disclosure, I work as a server. (Thats the gender neutered term for waiter/waitress that is now preferred by most companies.)
For starters, every restaurant have ever worked for pays their servers SUB MINIMUM WAGE (legally). Depending on the minimum wage in the state, you can make as low as two dollars an hour. I work at one of the bigger corporate owned restaurants (in a hotel) and I make a grand four bucks an hour. Therefore my income is almost entirely tips.
If you are eating at a moderate to expensive restaurant, ask your waiter whats the setup there. Some places the staff pool their tips (socialist system) while at other places its winner-take-all (capitalist system). If the person waiting on you is cool, feel free to ask them how the tips are divvied. If people ask me, I have no problem explaining how it works. It's not like I mention how much I make, but I give them the formula for figuring out whats up.
Additionally, I have no problem getting no tip if I really did a crappy job. I have bought many a meal through my brief career because I know that I screwed up and I was the one at fault. If you feel you got shafted, go right ahead and don't tip; otherwise be kind to your server.
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JBW
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