Opinion ID: 3065468
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: an additional amount on account of the

Text: tips received by such employee which amount is equal to the difference between the wage specified in paragraph (1) and the wage in effect under section 206(a)(1) of this title. The additional amount on account of tips may not exceed the value of the tips actually received by an employee. The preceding 2 sentences shall not apply with respect to any tipped employee unless such employee has been informed by the employer of the provisions of this subsection, and all tips received by such employee have been retained by the employee, except that this subsection shall not be construed to prohibit the pooling of tips among employees who customarily and regularly receive tips. Id. 1 [3] We shall unpack this dense statutory language sentence by sentence. The first sentence states that an employer must pay a tipped employee an amount equal to (1) a cash wage of at least $2.13,9 plus (2) an additional amount in tips equal to the federal minimum wage minus such cash wage.10 That is, an employer must pay a tipped employee a cash wage of at least $2.13, but if the cash wage is less than the federal mini- 9 See 29 U.S.C. §§ 203(m), 206(a)(1) (1996). 10 See 29 U.S.C. § 206(a)(1). CUMBIE v. WOODY WOO, INC. 2893 mum wage, the employer can make up the difference with the employee’s tips (also known as a “tip credit”). The second sentence clarifies that the difference may not be greater than the actual tips received. Therefore, if the cash wage plus tips are not enough to meet the minimum wage, the employer must “top up” the cash wage. Collectively, these two sentences provide that an employer may take a partial tip credit toward its minimum-wage obligation. [4] The third sentence states that the preceding two sentences do not apply (i.e., the employer may not take a tip credit) unless two conditions are met. First, the employer must inform the employee of the tip-credit provisions in section 203(m). Second, the employer must allow the employee to keep all of her tips, except when the employee participates in a tip pool with other customarily tipped employees. 2 [5] Cumbie argues that under section 203(m), an employee must be allowed to retain all of her tips—except in the case of a “valid” tip pool involving only customarily tipped employees—regardless of whether her employer claims a tip credit. Essentially, she argues that section 203(m) has overruled Williams, rendering tip-redistribution agreements presumptively invalid. However, we cannot reconcile this interpretation with the plain text of the third sentence, which imposes conditions on taking a tip credit and does not state freestanding requirements pertaining to all tipped employees. A statute that provides that a person must do X in order to achieve Y does not mandate that a person must do X, period. [6] If Congress wanted to articulate a general principle that tips are the property of the employee absent a “valid” tip pool, it could have done so without reference to the tip credit. “It is our duty to give effect, if possible, to every clause and word of a statute.” United States v. Menasche, 348 U.S. 528, 53839 (1955) (internal quotation marks omitted). Therefore, we 2894 CUMBIE v. WOODY WOO, INC. decline to read the third sentence in such a way as to render its reference to the tip credit, as well as its conditional language and structure, superfluous.11 [7] Here, there is no question that Woo’s tip pool included non-customarily tipped employees, and that Cumbie did not retain all of her tips because of her participation in the pool. Accordingly, Woo was not entitled to take a tip credit, nor did it. See Richard v. Marriott Corp., 549 F.2d 303, 305 (4th Cir. 1977) (“[I]f the employer does not follow the command of the statute, he gets no [tip] credit.”). Since Woo did not take a tip credit, we perceive no basis for concluding that Woo’s tippooling arrangement violated section 203(m).12