So you're glad you're not a Wall Street trader these days? At least they banked fat salaries and maybe got a golden parachute. The story's not so green at your local restaurant. These are bad times to be a server. Dangerous, even, because their tips have plummeted faster than the Dow Jones.

One New York City waiter has said that the bottom has fallen out for America's service professionals. He wrote that early this year, he'd make about $500 a week over five shifts. This summer, restaurant sales fell for the first time in two and a half years. Today, $270 for a full week is typical. People are guarding their cash, and they aren't coming into restaurants as much anymore. When they do, they're increasingly cheap. The 20% tip, once more or less standard for good service, is a memory. Some customers are merely rounding up to the nearest dollar.

The horror of this comes from the fact that many of our service professionals are vulnerable even in the best of times. They simply don't make an adequate hourly wage -- it's below minimum wage. They usually don't get insurance. They can be fired at the drop of a napkin. The expectations have been that they'd make plenty to live on through their gratuities, and if that failed, they could just switch to another restaurant. But with more people paying less in service charges, and with few places in need of new staff, that is now just a fantasy.

Most customers would never consider walking out of a restaurant without paying their bill in full. That would be theft. But because tips are discretionary, there are plenty of cheapskates who think nothing of bolting without a proper tip, or of justifying a dramatically reduced tip with some minor infraction. And now waiters (and bellhops, and valet parking attendants, and dozens of other ubiquitous workers) are finding it impossible to make their rents.

In presenting the ongoing case that America is turning into latter-day Rome, I present the all-you-can-eat buffet. Shamefully wasteful? Possibly, especially when the leftovers are thrown away. Horrifyingly indulgent? To a European, maybe. But in a country where we shield our children from actual porn, the typical endless buffet is one borderline bacchanalian orgy that we can confidently call family-friendly.

As grocery prices spike, there's no better time to acquaint yourself with the basic principles for squeezing every smidgen of value from your next buffet sitting. One of the prime ways to maximize your buffet buck is go for lunch. It's always a few dollars cheaper than dinner (at the Bellagio in Las Vegas, lunch can be as much as $15 cheaper). Going then may also save you from gaining as much weight as you would from a dinner banquet, because you'll still have many hours left in your day to burn off that calorie infusion. You'll also likely want a smaller dinner after all that afternoon food, saving you even more cash later in the day.

Lots of unlimited buffets, such as at the Golden Corral chain, switch dinner pricing in mid- to late-afternoon, but provided it's open continuously, you pay the price charged at the moment you sit down, not when you leave. Plan things right, and you can enjoy the dinner buffet, which may include an expanded menu, at the lunch price. In Vegas and Orlando, two towns packed with crowded buffets, going well outside of the mealtime rush is a smart time-saving strategy, too, because you won't have to wrestle so many other sharp-elbowed customers for the fried shrimp.

In great news for cows but another blow for vacationers, the cruise vacation giant Royal Caribbean has elected to charge $14.95 to anyone who orders New York strip steak in the main dining room. Eat all you want, the line says. Just not that.

Much of the fun of taking a cruise has been that everything's included in your fare. You can swim, pig out on the buffet, dance, splurge on lobster, and get somewhere interesting all for the same price, which on the major lines pans out to be between $100 and $200 a day. Here we have a cruise line deciding that your $150 doesn't include steak. So much for feeling like you can indulge.

If serving steak is such trouble, you have to wonder why Royal Caribbean doesn't just raise the price up the cruise by $10 or so. (Or better yet, ease up on the mountains of uneaten food at the afternoon buffets.) Then everyone can have their steak and eat it, too. The cruise line collects money from people who would never order a cruise line steak, and customers will come away with the illusion of value rather than with the bitter taste of nickeling-and-diming in their mouths.

Tighter economic conditions are giving waitstaff a double whammy. Not only are food and gas prices rising rapidly, many who work in restaurants are earning less than they used to.

As consumers become more thrifty and eat out less, this hits waitstaff right in the pocketbooks. And when diners do show up, they're often likely to order less (decreasing their bill and therefore the tip if they do a percentage) and some even tip a lower percentage than usual.

Check out this video for some insights on just how much this can hurt restaurant employees:



Tracy L. Coenen, CPA, MBA, CFE performs fraud examinations and financial investigations for her company Sequence Inc. Forensic Accounting, and is the author of Essentials of Corporate Fraud.

With food costs rising at a furious pace, restaurants are looking to avoid increasing their menu prices: by serving smaller portions. In addition, many chains are offering really small servings in an effort to lure in health- and budget-conscious consumers.

It's working to the extent that the small servings have quickly become big sellers, but it isn't making people any thinner. According to the USA Today, "Instead, people are using smaller dishes as an excuse to add to their orders, spending - and probably eating - just as much as before."

That's right! No pesky fun-sized dishes are going to interfere with our pursuit of the American Dream: the 42-inch waistline. But at least ordering smaller portions makes people feel healthier -- even if they order 7 of them.

I bet those are the same people who order 2,900-calorie cheese fries, and then wash them down with a Diet Coke.

New York City recently passed a controversial rule requiring that any restaurant chain with more than 15 locations nationwide.

The New York State Restaurant Association appealed but Judge Richard J. Holwell of United States District Court in Manhattan rejected the group's claim that the rule violated restaurants' first amendment rights.

In his ruling, Holwell mentioned the obesity epidemic sweeping across the country and said that the posted calorie counts might induce some diners to reconsider their choices and that "these choices will lead to a lower incidence of obesity."

Seems reasonable. And obvious. It's a shame that the New York State Restaurant Association is looking to prevent consumers from having increased access to nutritional information. Giving consumers more information so they can make an informed decision is always a good thing to do.

And the restaurants probably don't have much to worry about. The 1990 Nutrition Labeling and Education Act that required packaged food manufacturers to provide detailed nutritional information was met with similar outrage. Now it's an accepted part of the law, and Americans have continued to get fatter.

When dining out with a group of friends, one of the easiest ways to pay is simply to divide the total check by the number of people, with each person paying the same amount, irrespective of who bought what. It's quicker, easier for the server, and reduces that awkward discussion of money over dinner.

But if you're a water and crackers guy and your friends like wine and Ahi appetizers, this obviously puts you at a disadvantage. You're subsidizing other people's expensive habits. But there's another reason not to split it like this: Your total check will also be bigger.

In his book The Economic Naturalist: In Search of Explanations for Everyday Enigmas, economist Robert H. Frank discusses this phenomenon: if a diner is choosing between a $20 dish and a $30 dish he will, without even thinking, perform a cost benefit analysis. If the the $30 dish is only worth $5 more to him than the $20 dish, he may choose to go with the $20 dish: the additional benefit does not equal the additional cost.

But if he is with a group of 5 people, that additional $10 is only $2 to him and each other person --and so it makes sense for him to go with the $30 dish, even if the added value is not equal to the total the group will pay.

I'm not saying that your friends are mooches who are consciously looking to dine lavishly at your expense. But on a subconscious level, it means that splitting the check evenly will lead to higher costs -- and more calories!