Soda taxes, beer taxes, cigarette taxes, junk food taxes, and now……. cooking oil taxes!

Colorado Restaurant Association Big Cheese Pete Meersman is afraid the city of Denver’s Department of Revenue is jumping out of the frying pan and into the fryer.

At issue? During some recent restaurant-industry audits, the city has claimed separate sales tax on frying oil, claiming that the oil is a separate product because it is not absorbed into the product.

Try telling that to a cardiologist who wants you to cut down on French fries.

“Let’s say you have a grilled cheese sandwich restaurant,” Meersman said. “All the products you get in — including the oil, bread, cheese, garnishes — you don’t pay sales tax on because you’re going to turn around and add all those costs up, charge a price and the customer pays sales tax on top of that.

“The problem with trying to collect sales tax on wholesale cooking oil is that it is already being taxed on the retail side.”

The city’s vigilance in trying to collect a separate tax on oil has boiled to the point where Sysco Denver Food Service Co., the largest food-service distributor in the Rocky Mountain region, is disputing a $90,000 tax assessment on fry shortening.

I wonder if different ils will be taxed at different rates. I hope they take it easy on extra-virgin olive oil.

What next? Who knows, I am afraid to ask! H/T Michelle Malkin