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You have to tip 20% of the bill minimum. You can round-up only from there.
It's considered very rude to tip less than 20% because in the US, most service workers are legally allowed to be paid less than the minimum wage ($2 or $3 per hour is not uncommon).
You should give $1 to a bartender for every drink you order. If it's an expensive city, you should give $2 per drink.
Yep, 20% is minimum these days. And if you're at a nice cocktail bar, it's customary to do a min 20% tip on your bill rather than a per-drink tip. Also worth noting that the wage paid by employers to waitstaff and bartenders usually disappears into taxes, and wage theft and refusal to pay overtime is common. People often have to give a percentage of their total sales to bussers and barbacks; this is called a tip-out, and it isn't reduced if tips are low. If a server has a really bad day with low tips, they can literally wind up losing money.
To those who don't tip in protest, you're not helping. Employers do not care. If they even notice, they're likely to just assume the server is bad at their job and 'discipline' them, and / or move them to a worse shift where they will earn less. All you're doing is forcing someone to work for you, for free, in a hellscape working environment, so that you can have a nice time. By doing this, you are making someone's life tangibly worse.
I've spent years in the US service industry at all levels; if you've never spent significant time in the industry, however bad you think it is, it's worse. Every job I've held in the hospitality industry has easily been more physically, mentally, and emotionally taxing than any professional role I've had.
Yes. You are expected to tip waiters, hotel housekeeping (usually a few dollars a night left in the room after your stay), taxi drivers, valet, delivery drivers, and bellhops. You would also tip hairdressers/barbers, event planners, movers, and some other personal service people (less common to use these people on vacation). The "standard" tip is 20% for good service. If they were outstanding you could tip more, if they are bad you could tip less. In the US there is a lot of political lobbying against paying tipped positions more so your tip is a significant part of their salary. If you tip in cash it makes people extra happy because they get that money directly rather than waiting for credit cards and their employer to cut the check. You do not have to tip plumbers, electricians, trash collectors, gas station attendants (if in NJ where we have those), cashiers, and fast food workers.
To clarify, it isn't just table service if you are in a bar. You are expected to tip at bars, this has been the case for a long time.
My rule of thumb is tip only if a restaurant brings you water refills.
It depends on the business. My advise would to look around you to see what everyone else is doing.
I already replied but I just wanted a top level comment regarding:
that extra expense in a country where everything is already so expensive really makes a difference
That tip expense would be paid either way. There's no difference between charging $9 for a sandwich and tipping $1 vs being charged $10 for the sandwich and no tip. All costs always get passed down to the consumer no matter what, that's just how it works. So it isn't an "extra" expense. It is, was, and always will be in there, one way or another. I agree tipping is weird, inefficient, and difficult to understand, but you're gonna pay no matter what.
I only tip if someone had to do something to get me that food/experience. Picking up food to take home? No tip. The restaurant makes you get your own food from the counter and do your own refills? No tip. The checkout screen might have a tip, but I'm putting 0.
It's not really your personal responsibility, it's the restaurant owners responsibility. If people aren't getting enough tips in a restaurant where tips are the big draw, and that causes wait staff to quit, the restaurant owner should be paying his people to subsidize that.
15-20% also is not a hard rule. There's a lot of places where I live that try to pass off costlier food in shitty atmosphere (think 30 dollar entrees, but the server sees you twice and it's a "theme" restaurant). If I think someone did well and engaged with us as customers and were pretty good about making suggestions on the menu or being extra attentive to drink refills, then guaranteed they're getting within that 15-20%. Anything less than that, then I as the customer who only gets to make that judgement call off of the limited interaction we have, and you'll get 7-10% or 5 bucks, whichever is bigger.
No, you don't have to tip. Really unfortunate that some people rely on tips for their wage, but If you don't tip, you're NTA.