Needless to say, Show-Me Daily is not exactly proud to have potentially contributed to a tax increase.

The post I Should Have Just Kept Quiet About This appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

My experiment led to two major findings: 1) Wow, there are a lot of sub shops on Euclid; and, 2) criminy, some of these sales taxes are high! I think most people would be surprised to find out that the sales taxes charged by different restaurants in the Central West End varied by as much as 5 percent. That’s 50 cents on a $10 lunch order for restaurants located only a block apart. (Everything I got was “to go,” but it is a good question whether I should be charged the additional extra sales tax on “sit-down restaurants” in the city. Nor should it involve Missouri’s reduced sales tax on food, which does not apply to restaurants.)

Here is a composite of seven receipts from the past few weeks — including one receipt from Starbucks that was obviously from a fellow employee, because I have never had a cup of coffee in my entire life. (Yes, we know it’s not a sub shop.)

The sales tax rates vary from 10.99 percent to less than 6 percent. (Please note that because of rounding, you can’t be sure in some examples whether the tax is 10 percent or 9.99 percent.) When you go to the Jimmy John’s or Planet Sub on Euclid, you pay multiple additional sales taxes that help fund the development districted in which they are located. In this case, it is the Euclid Buckingham Transportation Development District (at least). That leads to a high sales tax of 10.99 percent. If you go across the street to Pickles Deli, you pay 1 percent less. You save a tiny bit more if you go to either of the Subways in the area; both charged 72 cents on a $7.25 bill, or 9.99 percent. (Again, rounding could also make it 9.98 percent or so. I wish they listed the exact rate on the bill, like Starbucks and Jimmy John’s do.)

The Starbucks on Maryland also charges the 10.99-percent sales tax, with a 32-cent tax on a $2.90 bill. Here we see some unfortunate weaknesses in the data. Because Community Improvement Districts, Neighborhood Improvement Districts, etc. can have generic names, you can’t always tell which one a particular address might be located in. The GEO St. Louis parcel address data does list the TIF district that might apply to a property, but it does not list CIDs, etc. Finally, the state TDD list does not list individual properties.

The real shocker, though, is the St. Louis Bread Company on the Forest Park Parkway. (Ignore the word “Panera” on the receipt.) The sales tax there is less than 6 percent! How the heck can restaurants one block apart have a tax difference of 5 percent? The answer is that, somehow, this particular Bread Company has not been included in any of the special taxing districts that add an additional sales tax. (It is most likely the beneficiary of some type of property tax incentive, but property taxes are not the point of this post.) It might be the only restaurant in the CWE that is outside of any special business districts, and not in any CID, TDD, etc. (Here is a good new city database on these issues.) The big question, though, is whether or not some restaurants are improperly charging — or improperly not charging — the extra sit-down sales tax rate of 1.5 percent. (Read section 92.325 of the state statutes for the pertinent laws.)

While I will remain a fan of Jimmy John’s and Planet Sub (especially on $2.50 Turkey Sub Thursdays), the realization that I am voluntarily giving 5 percent more to the government just because I go there will probably have me patronizing the Bread Co. more often. Then again, perhaps this blog post will have the unfortunate effect of leading to the Bread Company collecting the extra restaurant sales tax like the other places appear to do.

The post Sub Shops and Sales Taxes: A Delicious Natural Experiment appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

On the topic of food, my next stop along my journey was to grab a bite to eat at Bread Co. While scanning the menu on the wall, I noticed something I hadn’t ever seen before in Missouri — the calorie counts of all the food posted right next to the offerings. Amazing again! Free information at my disposal to make a decision about my health.

Why get excited over something so mundane? For one, there was a free exchange of useful information. The price system — much like the nutritional information system — is an amazing way of communicating information quickly and accurately. Second, in both instances the information was freely provided. Missouri restaurants, unlike some in New York City, are not required by law to include caloric information on their menus. But businesses here are still free to post that information as upfront as they’d like.

Best of all, businesses that choose to be more open with their information freely elect to bear the costs of collecting that information. The burden is usually on the customer to sort out the nutritional value of her food, but in some cases it may be in a restaurant’s business interest to display information more explicitly, or even to be more charitable. The result is a free and fair exchange of information or money that leaves both parties better off.

Ultimately, the most fascinating part of my journey was the fact that the businesses and I were free to choose. The businesses chose to offer certain services and bear those costs in the hope of attracting or retaining more customers. For my part, I could have purchased a sports physical if I wanted, but I didn’t need to. I could have purchased the healthiest sandwich on the menu, or the least healthy. I could have ignored the caloric content completely, and ordered dessert for dinner. No one got to tell me what to order, and I could have left the restaurant altogether if I had wanted. Information freely available at my disposal helped shape my decisions.

As usual, the more freedom and information we have as a society, the better choices we can make for ourselves and those we care about. And that’s always something to get excited about.

The post A Free-Market Journey appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The company is hoping that proceeds will cover the cost of the new facility’s food, rent, and salaries. Baked goods offered will be day-old bread from nearby St. Louis Bread Co. and Panera outlets, which will cut down on expenses. Any extra profit will be directed toward the charitable cause the chain has chosen to fund via this new venture: training at-risk youths. The company hopes to expand the new “Cares” stores across the country, under the name “Panera Cares Cafe.”

This is not an entirely new model; restaurants in Denver and Salt Lake City, for instance, also feature a “pay what you can” motto. Panera, however, has the advantage of a national distribution network, allowing the chain to use its economies of scale in order to save on costs.

Here’s the part I find most intriguing: The “suggested price” does not include sales tax, because the food customers receive is not technically being sold. This means that if a customer donates the same amount for a particular item that she would have paid at an ordinary Panera, an even larger portion can be devoted to charitable purposes than would otherwise be the case.

In a media environment that emphasizes corporate mismanagement, malfeasance, and negative externalities, St. Louis Bread Co. Cares is a great public relations move. It is also an interesting way for a corporation to give back to a charitable cause. Whether the model is sustainable will be seen over the next few months. At the very least, its initial efforts seem to be working:

[Ron Shaich, who stepped down as Panera CEO last week] converted the restaurant into a non-profit and reopened it Sunday. As it turns out, he says, the location’s revenue was actually up 20% on opening day vs. the previous Sunday.

What’s more, says Shaich, who spent Sunday and Monday at the cafe, one-third of those who ate at the restaurant left more than the suggested retail price.

I patronized the St. Louis Bread Co. location in Clayton when our office was only a few blocks away. Every time I’ve gone there, it has been relatively busy. I imagine that customer base will increase with the redesign, which may help the store increase its charitable impact. I, for one, hope that the model is successful enough to generate money for a worthy cause.

The post For-Profit Restaurant Goes Nonprofit appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

Steinmetz says it’s a slippery slope:

[T]he sale of this subway station seems to be a harbinger of more distressing and confusing sales to come. Another commenter satirically encapsulated this worry in “Modern Subway Directions”: “Get on at McDonalds and go five stops to Starbucks. Transfer to the Walmart and continue on to Staples.” And if subway stops are for sale, why not streets? If streets are for sale, why not whole towns? Will Missourian legislators be someday casting votes in Microsoft City?

Let’s not get so attached to the names of our streets and bus stops. Even without corporate sponsors, these names can change. In cases where a street retains its name for decades, people usually forget the original significance anyway. The only problem I can imagine with saying, “Get off at Staples,” is that passengers could be confused whether they should look for a Staples store or a stop named Staples. The ambiguity would diminish as people get used to the new names. Some people were confused when St. Louis Bread Company became Panera, too, but they survived.

Things get murkier when the advertisers aren’t harmless office supply stores. What if, instead of cleaning up trash on a highway, the National Socialist Movement decided to sponsor a bus stop instead? While most drivers overlook the “Adopt-a-Highway” signs, bus stops get more attention. Would we have to rename the neighboring stops to get back at the neo-Nazis?

Such issues regarding advertising in public spaces will need to be sorted out — if only because we can’t name everything after a dead president or a British province.

The post Sacred Bus Stops appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

The post Slow News Day appeared first on Show-Me Institute.

I’d blame this on bad governmental policy if I could (oh, I wish I could), but Panera claims that the move is necessary in order to consolidate business units, and also because it has had difficulty in finding the right office space for its expanding staff in the St. Louis metro area.

Besides, it’s not like business is going to be any cheaper in Taxachusetts.

The post Boston Bread Co.? appeared first on Show-Me Institute.