OK, Eurofag, let's break it down.
A restaurant has to pay payroll taxes. If they were to charge more for the food and pay their waiters a reasonable wage, not only do prices increase and sales go down, but their payroll taxes go up, and they go up more than the sales tax on the food prince increase could ever cover.
As a waiter, I don't pay taxes on what I earn as tips. I pay taxes on a percentage of my sales. If I sell $1000 of food and drink, I'm going to be paying taxes as if I received $180 in tips (18% of sales). This is whether I actually earned that much money or not, and on top of whatever taxes I have to pay for my regular minimum wage salary.
Let's see how this plays out irl:
I sell $1000 in product and am going to pay taxes on $180. But my tables were filled with guests like the ones described in this thread (blacks, Jews, and Eurotrash), so in actuality, I only collected $150 in tips. Of my tips, 10% go to my bussing staff: delivering your food, clearing the plates. $5 goes to the dishwasher (who has the worst job in the house.) $10 goes to my manager and concierge staff who handled your reservation, sat you at your table, processed your check, and smoothed over any incidents. I'm responsible for buying and cleaning my own uniform, including specialty items i would never have owned: apron with the restaurant logo, maybe a tux if I'm catering. Some restaurants demand unpaid training.
150-18-15-5-10=$102
minus the costs I incur (uniforms, unpaid training)
I'm selling $1000 over an 8 hour shift and earning $12/hr. The restaurant owner is saving money on payroll taxes, the bussing and managerial staff do not claim the tips I've paid them, I do. And all for what?
So YOU have some flexibility as to what you can pay. If your dish was $10 + tip, you can pay $12. Or you can be a shitty human being and just pay $10. Or, if you would like, the restaurant owner can decide to charge you $15 flat.
But keep complaining, bitch.