The thinking is that your customer IS your boss in the service industry. Your wages are influenced by the quality of your service, not the government or the whims of what your boss wants to pay. In most establishments the wait staff ends up making more money than they would from any sort of wage. If you end up in a place like McDonalds where they don't tip, you are going to be making something near minimum wage but these days even McDonalds pays more than minimum wage. There is a big push to raise the minimum wage to $15US but a lot of people think that will simply end up eliminating a lot of low wage jobs. It will also, no doubt, change our attitude on tips when prices rise to pay for that wage increase and those people in higher scale establishments where several hundred bucks a night is not unusual, might end up losing money.
I know lots of people in server world and if you work in a decent place, it ends up being a very lucrative job. Even in places like "Outback" (An OZ themed steak joint) my buddy's kid was making $300 a night on tips, in about 5 hours.
