We heard from a woman whose customer offered to pay her college tuition if she would have an affair with him, and a senior in high school who told of men hitting on her in front of their children as she waited on them.

And of course there was the story about the server who poured a strawberry daiquiri over a customer’s head after he kept running his hand up her skirt. But we’ll get back to that.

As we combed through the responses, we were struck by the sheer number of readers who had their own harrowing stories of mistreatment while working as servers or bartenders. Just like the scores of workers we interviewed for the article, many described the pressure to tolerate bad behavior in order to earn tips.

Especially telling: Many of you said the money made it worthwhile.