I've been living in the US for some years now, and on my trips back to Aus, I too notice the slow service in restraurants - it gets a bit annoying, but on the other hand, the food is always good, and I like paying the price it says on the menu. Still, nothing like giving a big tip to a bar tender in a busy bar at the beginning of the night and having him serve you first later when it's busy, eh?!

As for toasters, I'm fairly sure we just like to make life nice for people, and that no toast board is contributing to hotel campaigns in order to have toasters put in rooms. Things are usually done for quality of life, not shear profit in Aus, although alarmingly, from what I see on the news at least, there's signs of that changing . .

Cheers!