In my experience, everyone who defends tipping culture is defending not paying the tip. I don't buy this idea that someone likes tipping culture and still pays it. After all, you're free to tip anyone you want regardless of culture.

The problem is it is so ingrained in US culture that switching to tip-free has generally failed where tried, even in pro-labor lefty hoods in blue cities.

Numerous restaurants in NYC tried and flipped back over the last 10 years. Restauranteurs reported illogical / innumerate behavior where sales went down when they switched to untipped higher prices.

https://www.eater.com/21398973/restaurant-no-tipping-movemen...

The only restaurants that it stuck were Japanese restaurants that cater primarily to Japanese ex-pats, because culturally its familiar to them.