Fascinating Issue

Over Thanksgiving I noticed an extra sales tax at San Francisco restaurants. I asked my friends, "What's that about?" They rolled their eyes, "Newsom added a tax so all restaurants pay for their workers health insurance. Here is a link to an article from the San Francisco magazine titled: Is San Francisco Killing Its Restaurants?

But stories like these haven’t been heard so often these last couple of years. Opening a restaurant in San Francisco is becoming prohibitively expensive, and it’s tougher than ever for untested talent to strike out on its own. Even well-established chefs are beginning to question their future here. A widening rift between city hall and the local restaurant community has pitted two of San Francisco’s most cherished institutions—its culinary soul and its social conscience—against each other, and more and more restaurateurs are feeling like they’re losing the battle.

Watch this issue if you care about progressivism at all. Herein lies the fundamental progressive irony. In order to provide for all, you end up punishing the most productive. You end up cannibalizing your greatest strengths as a community. And this is not theoretical. Read the article. Each restaurant listed are gems of the San Francisco restaurant scene. The owners of Delfina take in $200,000 per year. After paying for the new healthcare law, they take home $100,000. What is that incentivizing? Do you think it makes them want to work more? Be more productive?

I'm going to call out progressives here. Most progressives are progressive in theory only. Most people in favor of universal healthcare are not at the same time willing to pay for it for others. Most progressive ideology, when you boil it down to business, amounts to: compelling others to pay for it. They naturally target the rich - and by rich - they often mean people who make high incomes. Versus, people with wealth. This is total side issue - but why not tax wealth vs. income anyway? Why do progressives not argue for this? I'm not a progressive, so I understand why I don't support it. But I wonder why no one talks about this...

...separate note, a true progressive ought to practice what they preach. And by that I mean, pay for other people's healthcare themselves. See how it feels. See how difficult it is. Try it. Start a small business and hire people and pay for all their healthcare and retirement, etc. See how much it costs. See how you balance it with the incoming money. And if you are somehow savvy enough to survive in this brutal world, treat all your employees humanely, and turn a profit. And when you do all this - and you retain your progressive ideals and it mirrors your own business practices - then you earn the right to be listened to.