SEATTLE (AP) — Menu prices are up 21 percent and you don't have to tip at Ivar's Salmon House on Seattle's Lake Union after the restaurant decided to institute the city's $15-an-hour minimum wage two years ahead of schedule. 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, Arturo Ramirez, left, and other workers crowd the kitchen at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1,... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, server Zachary DeYoung carries a tray of food at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1, Ivar’s Seafood... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, server Ling Powers smiles as she talks with customers at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1, Ivar’s... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, Arturo Ramirez backs away from a cloud of steam escaping from a steamer at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, Bob Donegan, president of Ivar’s Seafood Restaurants, stands below a Native American artwork in one of the company's restaurants in Seattle. After Seattle's... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, Arturo Ramirez, right reaches for plates stacked overhead as food is prepared at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, cook Bulmaro Sosa, right, goes over a food order with server Zachary DeYoung at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, server Zachary DeYoung presents the bill to a customer at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1, Ivar’s... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, workers prepare to bring food orders to customers at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1, Ivar’s Seafood... (Associated Press) 
 
 In this photo taken Monday, July 27, 2015, Chikwanha Nyashanu prepares fish at an Ivar's restaurant in Seattle. After Seattle's new minimum wage law took effect last April 1, Ivar’s Seafood Restaurants... (Associated Press) 
 
 It is staff, not diners, who feel the real difference, with wages as much as 60 percent higher than before. One waitress is saving for accounting classes and finding it easier to take weekend vacations, while another server is using the added pay to cover increased rent. 
 
 Seattle's law, adopted last year after a strong push from labor and grass-roots activists, bumped the city's minimum wage to $11 an hour beginning April 1, above Washington state's highest-in-the-nation $9.47. Scheduled increases that depend on business size and benefits will bring the minimum to $15 within four years for large businesses and seven years for smaller ones. 
 
 There's little data yet on how the law is working. 
 
 "To the extent that we can look at macro patterns, we're not seeing a problem," Seattle Mayor Ed Murray said. 
 
 As Washington, D.C., and other cities consider following Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles in phasing in a $15-an-hour minimum wage, Ivar's approach, adopted in April, offers lessons in how some businesses might adapt. Ivar's Seafood Restaurants President Bob Donegan decided to raise prices, tell customers that they don't need to tip and parcel the added revenue among the hourly staff. 
 
 For some of the restaurant's lesser-paid workers — including bussers and dishwashers — that's meant as much as 60 percent more. Revenue has soared, supportive customers are leaving additional tips even though they don't need to, and servers and bartenders are on pace to increase their annual pay by thousands, with wages for a few of the best compensated approaching $80,000 a year. 
 
 "It's been a surprise," Donegan said. "The customers seem to like it, the employees seem to like it, and it seems to be working, at least in this location." 
 
 Rochelle Hann, 25, is a second-generation worker at Ivar's. Like her mom, she has performed a variety of roles, including serving, bookkeeping and even dressing up as a giant clam. If she keeps working 30 hours a week, her annual pay will jump about $12,000 — money she's socking away for accounting classes at a community college. 
 
 "Before, I felt like it was maybe not quite paycheck-to-paycheck, but now I don't even have to worry about it," she said. "I just went away for the weekend, and it was an easy expense." 
 
 Brett Richards, a 50-year-old singer and guitarist, has worked 25 years in food service, including the past eight at Ivar's. Before, he made minimum wage, plus tips. Now, he gets $15 an hour, including a share of the 21 percent menu price increase, plus any additional tips customers leave. He expects to make almost $7,000 more this year, money that's helping him with his increased rent and with taking his kids out to eat a little more often. 
 
 Other industries with minimum wage employees could have a tougher time as worker pay climbs. 
 
 "What we expect to observe is this is not going to be a policy that's universally good for everybody or bad for everybody," said Jacob Vigdor, a University of Washington professor who is leading a study of Seattle's minimum wage law. The study includes recurring surveys of 700 Seattle businesses and ongoing interviews with about 50 low-wage workers and their families. 
 
 Downtown Emergency Services Center, which relies heavily on government contracts to provide housing and other services for chronically homeless residents, might need to cut those services unless the city boosts its funding. 
 
 "The economic justice that would be happening for our employees would be borne by our clients, who are extremely vulnerable people," executive director Daniel Malone said. 
 
 In the restaurant industry, where many low-wage workers are employed, adapting could mean pooling tips among all workers, cutting shifts or relying on technology — such as cellphone applications that let customers pay electronically, rather than having someone dedicated to running the cash register. 
 
 "This last jump wasn't that far out of market, so it didn't require a lot of reworking of the financials," says Anthony Anton, president of the Washington Restaurant Association. "Those second and third jumps will be much bigger jumps. Everyone is talking about what to do." 
 
 At Ivar's Salmon House, decorated with century-old, hand-carved canoes and tribal art, Donegan attributes at least some of his pay policy's success to Seattle's white-hot economy. 
 
 Looking out the broad windows of the dining room across Lake Union, diners can take in pleasure boats and kayaks cruising by, seaplanes landing, the Space Needle — and across the water, the ever-growing Amazon campus that has brought tens of thousands of workers to the city in the past few years. 
 
 The restaurant's revenue is up 20 percent, said Donegan, who served on the mayoral committee that drafted the minimum wage law. 
 
 A few other table-service restaurants have started following suit, and Donegan said he gets inquiries every day from owners wondering how Ivar's policy is working. But the approach is unlikely to be replicated among fast food restaurants or others where servers make less in tips — even though New York City is making $15 an hour the minimum wage for fast food chains. 
 
 Even Ivar's isn't expanding its new policy to its quick-service seafood stands. 
 
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 Follow Johnson at https://twitter.com/GeneAPseattle ||||| Nearby, the Walrus and the Carpenter instituted a compulsory 20 percent service charge. At Manos Nouveau and Sous Beurre, both in San Francisco, the menu prices include tips and taxes. Dirt Candy, an upscale eatery on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, tacks on a 20 percent administrative fee. 
 
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 Amanda Cohen, the owner of Dirt Candy, said she had fielded a flood of phone calls from other restaurants asking how her no-tipping policy was working. 
 
 “I think that restaurants will have to do this,” said Ms. Cohen, who pays servers at Dirt Candy $25 an hour, well above the $7.50 for tipped workers that will go into effect in New York at the end of the year. “How else do you compensate for this extra money you’ll have to pay?” 
 
 Like many owners, Ms. Cohen has long wanted to close the yawning earnings gap between those who prepare the food and those who serve it. Tips are not shared with the kitchen staff, whereas the revenue from certain types of surcharges and higher menu prices can be distributed to everyone. 
 
 Restaurateurs tick off a long list of reasons for being drawn to the idea. In some cities like New York, where tipping is subject to a confusing welter of federal, state and local regulations and tax laws, eliminating it would simplify bookkeeping. Managers say it would also allow them to better calibrate wages to reward employees based on the length of their service and the complexity of their jobs. 
 
 Several also cited research showing that diners tend to tip black servers less and that the system can encourage sexual harassment of women. 
 
 Still, many fear a backlash from their customers and servers. 
 
 Although mandatory service charges are common around the globe, restaurant tipping is deeply ingrained in the American psyche. Owners worry that potential diners will see significantly higher prices without realizing that they include gratuities. Restaurateurs also worry their best servers will leave. 
 
 “The tipped culture is still what draws many people into our industry,” said Christin Fernandez, a spokeswoman at the National Restaurant Association. While the association estimates that the median hourly earnings for tipped servers are between $16 and $22, waiters at high-end restaurants can earn much more. 
 
 Chelsea Krumpler, a waitress at Manos Nouveau in San Francisco, said that many waiters she knows were skeptical of her $25-an-hour wage and no tips. But she says she is earning as much as before with no worries about slow nights. 
 
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 “It’s a little more secure,” said Ms. Krumpler, who has worked as a waitress for seven years. The policy has also drawn the staff closer together. “It’s more of a family,” she said. 
 
 Although the no-tipping idea is generating a lot of discussion, the number of restaurants that have signed on is still tiny, and they tend to cluster near the higher end of the price spectrum. 
 
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 Most are adopting a wait-and-see attitude. 
 
 “We don’t want to jump on the trend,” said Akop Paronyan, the general manager of E&O Kitchen and Bar in San Francisco. 
 
 With further mandated wage increases scheduled, Mr. Paronyan said the restaurant does need to be prepared. He is researching a hybrid model, where guests might be charged a mandatory 10 percent service charge and then encouraged to add a 5 percent to 10 percent gratuity. 
 
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 Brian Keyser, the owner of Casellula restaurant in Midtown Manhattan, would prefer to end tipping but does not think his staff members or his diners are ready to accept it. 
 
 Now he must contend with a minimum wage for tipped workers that is rising in New York. That means giving his servers a $2.50-an-hour raise — even if they are already pulling in about $25 an hour in tips. “I have a kitchen full of people making far, far less than that, and I would love to give them that money, but I can’t,” Mr. Keyser said. 
 
 For many industry veterans, the business model is changing at such a rapid clip that they are not certain how to respond. 
 
 When Daniel Patterson first started working as a chef in the early 1980s, he said, labor used to account for about a third of total costs, and owners could enjoy a 10 percent to 20 percent profit. Now, as a partner in five San Francisco Bay Area restaurants, Mr. Patterson says labor costs eat up about 40 percent to 45 percent of the budget. At the same time, rent costs are skyrocketing. 
 
 “Even a good restaurant doing a lot of business that’s popular on every level, is bringing 2 percent or 1.5 percent to the bottom line,” he said. “It’s like a not-for-profit.” 
 
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 Coi, Mr. Patterson’s two-Michelin-star restaurant, has had all-inclusive pricing since it opened in 2006. He tried the same strategy when he opened Aster in the Mission District a few months ago, and quickly realized it was not going to work. 
 
 “I really believe in that model, but our customers didn’t want it,” Mr. Patterson said, because they thought it was too expensive. “It’s about perception,” he said. “It’s not just about the dollars you’re spending, but what you think you’re spending.” 
 
 The next phase of the minimum wage increase in Seattle is pushing Brian Canlis, a co-owner of the upscale Canlis restaurant, to consider a pricing system that includes tips for 2016. 
 
 “I’ve got to have a hierarchy of pay,” Mr. Canlis said. He employs 96 workers to serve six meals a week. If the dishwasher earns $15 an hour, then the line cook needs to earn at least $18, he said. And then what about the sous chef, and the waiters? “There’s a cascading effect,” he said. 
 
 At the Walrus and the Carpenter, the owner Renee Erickson has been adjusting her no-tipping experiment. Although she originally wanted to adopt an all-inclusive menu, she “worried we weren’t going to have the opportunity to explain why our prices were so much higher than the restaurant right next door.” 
 
 Instead, she added an 18 percent service charge. But it did not generate enough money to cover the added labor costs. So she bumped the charge up to 20 percent and shrank the owners’ share. 
 
 As the weeks went by, she and her partner kept adjusting the percentage that went to the kitchen workers. To get the staff on board, she decided to let everyone see the payroll spreadsheets, so they could understand how the money was being allocated. 
 
 “We’ve gotten a lot of great support and feedback,” she said. And at two new restaurants Ms. Erickson is opening there will also be no tips. 
 
 At Ivar’s, eliminating tipping has been a success, said Mr. Donegan, the chief executive — thanks in part to the summer tourist season and a booming economy. Since the policy went into effect four months ago, wages have risen between $3 and $12 an hour, he said, with the lowest-paid worker earning $15 an hour. Everyone, including part-timers, has health insurance and a 401(k) retirement plan. 
 
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 The No. 1 complaint from customers? The prohibition on tips. So while the menu still states that prices include service, the credit card slips now have a line that reads: “If you INSIST on leaving a tip, write it here.”
– With many big cities upping the minimum wage, restaurant owners have to contend with higher labor costs—which has led some to abandon the practice of tipping in favor of raising menu prices or adding a mandatory service fee. At Dirt Candy, a Manhattan eatery, a 20% administrative fee is added to the bill in lieu of tipping—and servers are paid $25 per hour. (New York will require tipped workers be paid at least $7.50 starting at the end of this year.) "I think that restaurants will have to do this," the owner tells the New York Times. "How else do you compensate for this extra money you’ll have to pay?” Plus, while tips are not shared with those who work in the kitchen, the revenue from higher prices and fees can often be shared with all employees. "We saw there was a fundamental inequity in our restaurants where the people who worked in the kitchen were paid about half as much as the people who worked with customers in front of the house," explains the co-owner of Ivar's, a Seattle restaurant that raised prices 21% and eliminated tipping after the first stage of the city's $15 minimum wage took effect. Though some restaurateurs worry that servers will be put off by the idea of no tips, a server at a San Francisco restaurant that also pays $25 per hour says she earns as much as she always did at her new rate of pay—but now she earns the same amount per shift even if a night is particularly slow. Another concern is that diners simply aren't ready for the change. At Ivar's, credit card slips now include this line: "If you INSIST on leaving a tip, write it here." Earlier this month, the AP reported that Ivar's no-tipping experiment has been a success, with some staff wages as much as 60% higher than before.