California's Burger Police

Only small cups for soda! The California legislature is expected to pass a bill soon that will limit restaurant sales of sugary drinks, like Coca Cola, to small sized cups only. A punitive tax on sugary drinks is also expected to pass statewide, following a similar measure in the city of Berkeley that is seen as successful because it has succeeded in getting poor people to drink more water instead of more expensive soda.

Use this paper straw! Plastic straws are being banned throughout California, replaced by paper straws that get soggy quickly.

Pay an extra waiter surcharge! The City of San Francisco has passed a law requiring restaurants to pay underpaid waiters much more. Most restaurants have passed the increased costs on to customers by raising food prices, but many San Francisco restaurants have added a separate surcharge to the bill to account for the extra cost.

Did you request this straw first? NO? Then FIRE the waiter! Some jurisdictions in California, including Los Angeles, have new laws that impose severe penalties on restaurants that give straws to customers who didn’t ask for a straw first. There are inspectors who go to restaurants to check on compliance with the straw law, and if they find a customer didn’t ask for a straw before the waiter gave out a straw, they sock the restaurant with a big fine – this leaves restaurants in the position of mitigating the risk of big fines by clamping down on employees. The cartoonist went out to dinner at the Olive Garden last week and the waitress told him that the staff was warned that if they ever handed out a straw, without the customer asking for it first, they would be fired on the spot. Of course, the law doesn’t require that waiters be fired, but the penalties are so severe that restaurants threaten the waiters with similarly severe penalties to strike the fear of non-compliance in the waiters.

Free the chickens! California passed a law not long ago, that requires better living conditions for chickens, who can no longer be kept in small, efficient cages, thereby giving the chickens a better, and more costly, free-range lifestyle.

Cow Farts, Styrofoam and Banning Beef These issues transcend California, so no explanation here.

[Source: https://darylcagle.com| Daryl Cagle | March 6, 2019++]