In the Manhattan restaurants around Lincoln Center, the tips often rose and fell with the changing playbill. A popular classic musical could mean more preshow diners, and more income. A more famous actress as Eliza Doolittle could do the same. The end of a big run, like “My Fair Lady,” meant the opposite: Tips would be down for a while.
“We were dependent on how well shows were doing at Lincoln Center, and we really did pay attention,” said Emma Craig, who was a server at the Atlantic Grill a block away before the coronavirus crisis. She has not returned to that job yet, or to another singing at a private supper club downtown. In both jobs, she said, “I am dependent on the trickle down.”
The recession has crushed this kind of work in particular: service jobs that depend directly on the spending — and the whims — of the well-off. |
