I have a confession to make. I take inordinate pleasure when progressive policies go badly in the progressive capital of America — San Francisco.
I know it’s wrong of me to feel this way.
Too bad. Deal with it.
The latest welcome disclosure about San Francisco is that it’s ruining its own trendy left wing restaurant industry. I seriously doubt that today there is a single San Francisco “sit down” restaurant employing waiters that is NOT owned, operated and staffed by progressives.
EXCERPT: Restaurant closings outpace openings by 9%, according to Yelp data analyzed by the Golden Gate Restaurant Association. In a recent meeting with the Board of Supervisors, one industry veteran said: “We need to do something now, or we will be gone.”
Liberals are suffering as a result. I can handle it. As General George Patton reportedly said about war, “God help me, I love it so!“
Kudos to San Francisco for “taking one for the team.” Let’s see if the rest of the country learns from San Francisco’s mistakes. I’m taking no bets on that likelihood.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-san-francisco-is-killing-its-restaurants-11571351715
WALL ST JOURNAL
How San Francisco Is Killing Its Restaurants
Labor costs and regulation are ruining a once-thriving industry.
Congress should take it as a cautionary tale.
How did the outlook for a top restaurant city get so bleak? As Hemingway wrote of bankruptcy, it happened “gradually and then suddenly.”
Start with labor costs, which the San Francisco Chronicle identified as “the biggest factor.” In 2003 residents passed an initiative that set the minimum wage almost $2 above the state level and then linked it to rise with inflation. A decade later, another initiative incrementally lifted the wage floor to $15 an hour by 2018. On top of this, the city has separate ordinances regulating paid sick leave, employee health-care spending and workplace scheduling.
These costs are magnified by a quirk in California law that prohibits tip income from counting toward a restaurant employee’s hourly-wage requirement. An employee who earns several hundred dollars in tips on Friday night is considered no different from a dishwasher who earns none—even though tips are taxed as income by state and federal authorities. Restaurant owners must pay ever-higher hourly wages to top-earning employees whose take-home pay far exceeds minimum wage.
. . .
To read more, go to the WALL ST JOURNAL article:
https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-san-francisco-is-killing-its-restaurants-11571351715