Want to hear the CRAZIEST outrageous example of this phenomenon? I work in downtown San Francisco. My local coffee/sandwich/snack joint has begun arbitrarily tacking on $0.10 to every order, listed as "energy surcharge" on your receipt. Thus, when I buy a cookie in the middle of the afternoon at the advertised $1.40 price, my bill is $1.50. I asked the guy at the counter what the hell this was, and he explained that it goes on every order, no matter how big.

So Charles Schwab caters lunch for its execs at $400, and they get charged the 10c, and so does the slob on the street who asks for a cookie. That looks like a 7% gouge for the hungry snacker expecting the advertised price. Something tells me I'm sorry the Attorney General moved his people back to the Civic Center. Check it out if you're here: Specialty's (sic)(several financial district locations; use of apostrophe is their fault alone).