Have you gone out to eat lately? Well if the bill looks different it’s because now you just don’t have one tax…. There might be two! Move on over sales tax meet the “San Francisco’s Health Care Tax”.In beginning of the year, San Francisco businesses such as the restaurants that you and I frequent have been required to offer health insurance to employees or pay a fee to the city to fund health care.

As I found out last weekend at Park Chalet, some restaurants are passing the fee on to consumers in the form of a health surcharge tax. And after researching it a bit more from other sources as well as the Wall Street Journal, I found out the real story.

 Some restaurants now have a tax surcharge that they pass on to the clients which you will see on your bill. This is because it is now mandatory to have employee heath care (which was a measure in 2006). Therefore all businesses with 20 plus need to pay a specific amount towards their employee’s health care.  There are two ways to cope with this one pass it on to the customer or raise meal prices. However this is hurting a lot of mom and pop restaurants. So what will you do?

 To find out more about this issue click on this San Francisco government link:

http://www.sfgov.org/site/olse_index.asp?id=45168

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