{"id":30623,"date":"2025-07-29T00:40:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-29T00:40:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/30623\/"},"modified":"2025-07-29T00:40:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T00:40:11","slug":"las-vegass-tipped-workers-say-income-fell-by-more-than-half","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/30623\/","title":{"rendered":"Las Vegas’s tipped workers say income fell by more than half"},"content":{"rendered":"

Las Vegas workers have seen their income from tips plunge by as much as 50% \u2014 despite the recently passed no tax on tips law \u2014 as tourism to Sin City takes a hit <\/a>from President Trump\u2019s global trade war.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo tax on tips, that\u2019s a rad thing. But it doesn\u2019t really do us much good if there isn\u2019t any people to get tips from,\u201d Charlie Mungo, a 36-year-old tattoo artist in downtown Las Vegas, told the Wall Street Journal.<\/a><\/p>\n

Mungo said he has made about $1,500 a month in recent months.<\/p>\n

He added that Canadian customers, who made up about 30% of his clientele, have vanished.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re all starting to freak out,\u201d he told the Journal.<\/p>\n

Las Vegas hospitality workers report significant decreases in tip income as tourism declines more than 6% in 2025. lucky-photo \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n

Overall visitations to the city are down more than 6% through the first half of the year, with April 2025 recording just over 3.3 million visitors, representing a 5.1% drop from the previous April, according to the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA).<\/p>\n

Airport traffic has also decreased, with April passenger traffic at Harry Reid International Airport totaling 4.7 million, down 3.4% from April 2024.<\/p>\n

International visitor arrivals fell over 13% in June compared to the previous year, while domestic travel saw a 6.5% decline year-over-year, based on CoStar data.<\/p>\n

The overall\u00a0decline in tourism<\/a>\u00a0has hurt service sector workers who were expecting to benefit from Trump\u2019s campaign pledge to eliminate taxes on tips.<\/p>\n

The legislation was included in the \u201cBig Beautiful Bill,\u201d signed earlier this month, and\u00a0exempted up to $25,000 in annual tips<\/a>\u00a0from personal income taxes \u2014 retroactive to the start of the year.<\/p>\n

Jacob Soto, a 22-year-old supervisor at Pinkbox Doughnuts downtown, told the Journal that his weekly credit-card tips dropped from between $175 and $200 to anywhere from $100 to $150.<\/p>\n

With his $15-per-hour wage insufficient to cover basic expenses, Soto said: \u201cI kinda rely on tips at the end of the day.\u201d<\/p>\n

April passenger traffic at Harry Reid International Airport totaled 4.7 million, down 3.4% from April 2024. Aerial Film Studio \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n

The empty feeling is apparent on the usually buzzing Las Vegas Strip. Hotel occupancy rates have declined to approximately 66.7% in early July compared to the same period last year, according to the LVCVA.<\/p>\n

Every morning, the NY POSTcast <\/a>offers a deep dive into the headlines with the Post\u2019s signature mix of politics, business, pop culture, true crime and everything in between. Subscribe here!<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cVegas is not fun anymore,\u201d Amrita Bhasin, a retail-industry entrepreneur, told MarketWatch. <\/p>\n

She said that hotels in the city can charge as much as $50 in resort fees that make their stay even more expensive.<\/p>\n

Rising prices affect both workers and tourists. Wally Weidner, a 67-year-old Wisconsin visitor, said he\u2019s reconsidering his tipping practices.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust because prices went up doesn\u2019t mean I should pay more tip,\u201d Weidner said.<\/p>\n

Hotel occupancy rates have declined to approximately 66.7% in early July 2025 as visitors stay away from Sin City. Krakenimages.com \u2013 stock.adobe.com<\/p>\n

At Mon Ami Gabi restaurant on the Strip, a dinner-menu cheeseburger with fries now costs $30.95 plus tax and tip, compared to $16.95 four years ago.<\/p>\n

Rory Kuykendall, a 41-year-old California native who moved to Las Vegas a decade ago, works as a graveyard-shift bellperson at the Flamingo hotel and casino.<\/p>\n

Tips constitute 25% to 70% of his income depending on weekly business levels, according to the Journal.<\/p>\n

Kuykendall described his recent tip income as \u201cunderwhelming\u201d while facing increased costs for groceries and car insurance.<\/p>\n

He has reduced personal spending to manage finances.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really feels off,\u201d he told the Journal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Las Vegas workers have seen their income from tips plunge by as much as 50% \u2014 despite the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[45,49,48,46,135,1483,1674],"class_list":["post-30623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-economy","tag-inflation","tag-las-vegas","tag-tourism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}