At a time when unemployment locally is at a nearly 30-year low and the number of workers who are actively looking for a job has plunged by 56% over the last seven years, the competition for workers is intense. Even at the lower end of the wage scale, that competition is intensified by the state’s higher minimum wage for fast food workers, which currently is $12.75 an hour.

[Related: From cooks to dishwashers, Buffalo restaurants struggle to find the help they need]

Meanwhile, tipped workers in New York can be paid a reduced minimum wage, currently $7.50 an hour. The tips that those workers receive are meant to make up for the difference between their lower minimum wage and the minimum wage for other workers, now $11.10 an hour. If tipped workers fall short of the $11.10-an-hour minimum, employers have to make up the difference.

At a busy restaurant, servers will earn more from the extra volume, while the cooks' pay will remain the same, said Roy Bakos, who was a bartender and manager for 17 years at Pearl Street Grill & Brewery. Cooks can rely on the steady pay, even on slow nights, while a thin crowd could leave a bartender with little to show at the end of the night.