The only reason for restaurants to have paper thin margins is if there are too many of them. That will probably change once their waiting staff disappears.

Don't be afraid to charge what you're worth and what your customers can afford.

(My clients are mostly banks. I know they can afford me.)

And honestly, if people can afford to pay sky high San Francisco prices for everything else, they can also afford to pay them in restaurants.

Raising wages will never fix the problem. SF needs to build up or change laws to deincentivize people from living there (e.g. higher taxes on high-income tech workers). The latter has other issues associated with it, but would at least encourage the decentralization of tech talent to other parts of the country.

That's not the end game, because there is an endless supply of low paid labour willing to commute hours to work. Especially if the tips are better.

The places will be expensive, no doubt, but labour will capture a very small proportion of the hike, with the rest going to capital like brand and real estate owners.

The tech elite seems willing to cling to these sorts of market-mediated fair world falacies, because they refuse to acknowledge their own position in the capitalist society.