To tip or not to tip: take-out and pick-ups (tacran)

Yes, the Christmas gift/tip is another layer to consider!  Years ago when we had a lawn care guy, we paid him an extra week's fee at Christmas time.  And I've given my hair stylists gift cards (depending on the stylist, someplace they like, maybe Starbucks or Target). 

I haven't ever tipped our mail carriers or garbage service people here.  We don't have "manually carried" garbage bins here; they're all automatically picked up by the robotic arms on the trucks, so the service people don't have to get out of the truck and handle dirty bins, detached lids, etc.  It's a fairly clean process, for garbage collection!

Most neighborhoods here have a "community mailbox" with a bunch of little mailboxes in it, so the carrier pulls the truck up and puts all the mail in each little box.  I'd tip if he/she was carrying the huge mailbag, walking from house to house, individually delivering the mail, but I guess I don't feel there's extra work involved now.  Besides, they get huge pensions, don't they?  I'll save the tip for my own retirement fund, since no one contributes to that but me!

I don't tip for Chinese take-out because that comes from the Safeway deli, but I leave an extra $1 or $2 at the Taqueria because it's not their fault that I'm taking out instead of eating in and they do have to wrap it and bag it.  I tip for pizza delivery because what is better service than having dinner delivered right to the door?  Like Deb said, most of them are students and can use every $1 they get, and I'm pretty sure those jobs only pay minimum wage anyway.

Joyce

For coffee shops etc., I tip if I order something weird - for example, at Starbucks I sometimes want a floofy drink (e.g., peppermint white mocha!) that's half-caff. That must be annoying, because it's only 1 shot of espresso, so they have to do some extra leg work to get half a shot of regular and half a shot of decaff. I'm happy to show my appreciation for that.

BF always tips in tip jars because he worked through high school at an ice cream stand. When people left tips, even small ones, he was SO HAPPY that he always wants to pay it forward unless the service is bad. He tips especially generously (say, $2 for 2 ice creams) for young workers.

Cita, my sister has the same philosophy as your BF.  She worked in restaurants for many, many years, so she has that perspective and is therefore far more generous in all cases - with or without table service. 

The other day I had a salon appointment and the woman was running 30 minutes late.  She apologized many times, and then insisted on giving me some free product by way of more apology.  She really didn't have to do that, but I got some nice product I probably wouldn't have purchased otherwise, so I gave her a much larger tip that usual.  She was trying to "compensate" me for my time, but in exchange, I wanted to give her something for that expensive product!