Tattoo and Tattoo Removal

The Californianonline website relates a story of a young waitress at an Olive Garden Restaurant who was told to have her visible tattoo removed or go work in the kitchen where the customers couldn't see it. She decided that the cost of removal was too high and she didn't want to work in the kitchen, so she quit. Now she's considering a lawsuit because she's been stabbed in the back.

OK, let's analyze this story. The Olive Garden told her to get rid of the tattoo or go work in the kitchen. Should they and can they give her the ultimatum? Of course they should. It's a private business and they have the right to run it as they want. Can they? The courts generally think so and, moreover, it's common practice in many business fields to stipulate and enforce minimum appearance standards. It doesn't seem that the waitress has a chance of winning a court case.

To continue, the waitress, Karen Ketola, stated that she would not spend the $150 to $300 per session to have the tattoo removed. From here I'd like to digress and discuss the cost.

My research found that currently there seems to be no comprehensive effort to collect data concerning tattoo removal. Information that is available is based primarily upon the experiences of practitioners of tattoo removal. Understandably, many varied experiences will produce imprecise data. This, however, does not preclude the identification of specific ranges associated with the cost and number of treatment sessions required. The range would be as stated by the waitress, and confirmed by my research, $150 to $300 per session with an average minimum of 6 and as many as 20 or more sessions required depending on the size of the tattoo. The minimum total cost customarily is at least 10 to 15 times the cost of the original tattoo, while the maximum total cost can easily exceed 30 times. Forget about hundreds of dollars. To have someone remove a tattoo, even small ones, may cost thousands. One can easily see that it is much more lucrative to be in the business of removing tattoos than putting them on. It should be noted that health insurance companies will not cover the cost of tattoo removal. Payment for the service will be out-of-pocket.

One other data point worth mentioning is that it is generally agreed that, over time, more than 50% of people with tattoos regret ever having gotten them. Also, an unpublished (and often cited) random survey conducted about ten years ago estimated that at least 8 million Americans have tattoos. Based upon the above, 4 million regret having them. Of note is that, even if the population figures are grossly in error, a very small percentage of Americans have tattoos.

Getting back to the story, waitress Karen Ketola stated she was stabbed in the back and I agree. She got screwed royally, but it wasn't by The Olive Garden. In fact, the restaurant acted more than reasonably in my opinion. They explained the corporate policy, outlined her options (either have the tattoo removed or get transferred to the kitchen), and gave her adequate time to make a decision and act. There was nothing untoward.

But she did get screwed and it was before she walked into that parlor to get tattooed. Apparently nobody told her that a person displaying a tattoo is automatically considered unsuitable for certain types of jobs, such as, dealing with the public. Who's responsible? Who stabbed her in the back? I suggest, maybe her parents. They didn't take her aside and tell her that a visible tattoo will negatively impact her employment options. Or maybe her teachers in school stabbed her in the back because they were more interested in teaching diversity as opposed to giving her useful knowledge such that she would make prudent decisions. These folks could have informed Karen Ketola, but the simple reality is that she made the decision, she alone, to get tattooed. Possibly it was a frivolous or impulsive decision. Doesn't matter. What it wasn't was an informed and reasoned decision. Karen Ketola was stabbed in the back. She did it to herself.

Before closing, I'd like to make some other points. One concerns attending an out-of-state family reunion and meeting a 16 year old girl who had a tattoo the size of a floor tile on her back. She told me it took 8 weeks to put on and it hurt a lot and was expensive. I expressed surprise that her state laws allowed 16-year-olds to be tattooed to which she said she got it when she was 15 and there were no laws governing tattoos. Subsequently, I learned that she was right. Tattooing in America is unregulated. At the age of 15, this girl cannot drive, cannot drink, cannot buy cigarettes, cannot quit school, cannot vote, cannot enter into a legally binding contract, but she can go and get a tattoo which could stigmatize her for the rest of her life. This just don't seem right. There should be a minimum age for getting a tattoo and I recommend 21.

After rehabilitation, a significant impediment to making ex-convicts and ex-gang members employable is that they usually have numerous visible tattoos. Taxpayer funded tattoo removal programs, most notably in California and Texas, have started to address the problem. In addition, federal funds are starting to be disbursed for tattoo removal from people other than ex-convicts and ex-gang members. There is a noticeable trend toward having the taxpayer foot more and more of the bill for tattoo removal.

All the while, the tattooing of youngsters is unregulated and burgeoning. More and more 14, 15, 16, and 17-year-olds are getting visible tattoos. Take a walk through the mall on a Saturday afternoon and you'll see them. They tattoo their hands, arms, calves, ankles and I even saw one girl with a tattoo on her neck. For Christ's sake! These are kids who are going to wake up ten or fifteen years from now and want to get rid of their tattoos. And the way things are trending, taxpayers will pay for their removal.

I have a suggestion which may help. Produce a series of public service segments discussing the downside of having tattoos, emphasizing the fact that they make a person unemployable and then run them, over and over, between videos on MTV. I'm sure the message would eventually sink in and fewer tattoos would be put on youngsters. Fewer tattoos means fewer needing removal.

In summary, we've got an unregulated industry that's marking up our young people and, ultimately, it appears the taxpayer is going to foot the bill to take the markings off. We should do something.