Last I checked, about 20 years ago, Plumbers get $75 an hour including travel time. $125 today would not surprise me. WHO tips their plumber?

Now plumbing will be $25 an hour if you get a $100 tip.

It's a Republican idea. Is it really aimed at strippers?

out in the country and when I moved here a decade ago it was really difficult to get tradespeople out here. I tipped a plumber who came and worked on my well pressure tank. Normally I would consider a plumber a professional who might be insulted by a tip.

And remember the supremacist court ruling last summer that politicians could accept tips, but not bribes? I'm cynical enough to think that the end goal may be for politicians to get non-taxable "tips" from the wealthy.

I find it ironic when they're trying hard to eliminate cash that they want to make tips tax free.

When most tips were cash they were effectively tax-free since there was no record of them. Restaurants, etc., used to just assume an average percentage--say 8%--and report that for tax purposes, but nobody knew what you actually got in tips. Other sectors of hospitality--like golf shops, etc.--likely did not report even an estimate.

With many--if not the vast majority of--tips being added to the credit card bill these days they can report almost every dollar a tipped worker receives. That makes this tax exemption necessary--when in the past it really wasn't.

Lots of people working for tips in that state. It was still pretty close. When the tax break sunsets, the GOP will blame the Democrats for raising their taxes.

Is there a unintended consequence? Or maybe an intentional consequence.

will no longer be taxed for Medicare or Social Security. Not only will Medicare and Social Security be shorted by employees, but the employers get a tax break too.

Seems like a pretty shitty limitation and sure has been kept quiet.. Most tippers I think just add tips to their credit card receipt.

Here are some of the main points:

IRS: “Qualified tips” are voluntary cash or charged tips received from customers or through tip sharing. [they don't need to be cash only]

https://www.irs.gov/newsroom/one-big-beautiful-bill-act-tax-deductions-for-working-americans-and-seniors


Kiplinger: "Also, there’s no payroll tax break involved. That means you will still pay Social Security and Medicare taxes on your tips, even if you claim the income tax deduction."

]https://www.kiplinger.com/taxes/no-tax-on-tips-bill-approved

Cash essentially means currency to the IRS. Non cash means some other non currency item. Like a physical gift, stock or bond, crypto, or real estate. Basically if it can't be taken and deposited directly into a bank without having to be sold first, then its cash as far as the IRS is concerned. So physical cash, checks, bank transfers and debit/credit are all considered cash.

The more you pay into social security, the more you get out. These workers don't make a fortune, which they find out later on in life when they draw their social security. They really need to understand this. They will be contributing less.

This is a deduction after the fact, so the reported tips are still considered income. There is no payroll tax break even if someone takes the deduction.

With an expiration date of end of 2028, this means the benefit will be in place for the 2026and 2028 elections -- giving Republicans something to campaign on. Then, beginning in 2029, they can attack Democrats for letting the benefit lapse.

They did this with the estate tax and it was zero estate tax in 2010, which meant no limit on certain estate tax limit forward tax deductions. The recent GOP budgets have eliminated or reduced many tax dodges still active for the wealthy who got in before but are now eliminated.

These short term tax break gimmicks are an anemetha.

... deserve this benefit because it's a burden to have tips withheld for taxes by their employers. There's a lot of abuse by the employers, and even some outright theft of the tips.

Why not just pay adequate salaries to the wait-staff employees, and banish the practice of tipping? This seems to work well in the European countries, specifically Germany. It would solve a myriad of problems, and maybe then it wouldn't be so difficult to get and keep good employees.

I use cash. If I can't tip in cash, I don't use the service anymore. Too many of these companies are just using tips as a source of income for themselves.

...will probably find the process of claiming it too time consuming to follow through with.

But every one of them will happily go along thinking they are getting a huge tax break from Republicans.... It was always more of a PR stunt than anything--even when Harris followed along because she saw it for exactly what it was, but you can't be out PR'd in the political arena.

There's a lot of opportunity being created here.

and republican politicians ?