
Making Healthy SF Work

San Francisco Public Press (https://www.sfpublicpress.org/making-healthy-sf-work/)
San Francisco’s civil grand jury on Thursday chastised many of the city’s restaurants for profiting from surcharges they add to customers’ bills under the name of paying for health care and recommended that the city ban the practice.
Local, state officials must develop new models for care by 2014
This story appeared in the Spring 2012 print edition of the San Francisco Public Press.
San Francisco’s experiment in universal health care, which grew over the last five years to cover an estimated 85 percent of the city’s uninsured, may need to partly return to its origin as a network of safety net clinics and hospitals for the poor as national reforms syphon off middle-class patients. Healthy San Francisco provides medical services to more than 50,000 city residents. But the program could take a financial blow within the next two years as cities and counties adapt to national health reform.
A version of this story appeared in the Spring 2012 print edition of the San Francisco Public Press.
It’s no wonder there is a hue and cry about an uneven playing field among businesses as they comply with San Francisco’s Health Care Security Ordinance. The law requires most employers to provide health care benefits to workers who put in at least eight hours a week. But an analysis of compliance reports submitted by 15 randomly selected employers to the city’s Labor Standards Enforcement Office finds that they spent wildly different amounts on health benefits per employee in 2010, the most recent year reported.
The San Francisco Public Press publishes investigative reporting online and in print, and produces audio journalism through podcasts and on KSFP, 102.5 FM. As a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization, we have received funding from national and local foundations and thousands of individuals. Donations are tax deductible to the extent allowed by law.
We depend on your support. A generous gift in any amount helps us continue to bring you this service.
Donate Now