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There is such a thing as a Public Benefit Corporation. The goal is to deliver well a product/service to the public at a reasonable cost with modest profit to shareholders.
The goal is to deliver the top product/service, not to maximize profits.
Utilities are textbook examples of PBCs or related corporations, or should be in the case of electricity generation.
There are still issues - look at PGE in CA.
But in most places most of the time, PBC or related solutions are what you want for core infrastructure.
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It reminds me of when they made fire department coverage optional in rural Tennessee and some people said, yeah! Lower taxes! Stick it to the man!
...and then they had a fire and the fire trucks showed up, just to protect the houses next door who had paid the few bucks to the fire department...and the guy whose house was on fire was running around saying I’ll pay! I’ll pay!
...and the fire guys were like, yeah, it doesn’t work like that. Welcome to the “free market”, bub.
Penny wise, pound foolish.
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pdq wrote:
It reminds me of when they made fire department coverage optional in rural Tennessee and some people said, yeah! Lower taxes! Stick it to the man!
...and then they had a fire and the fire trucks showed up, just to protect the houses next door who had paid the few bucks to the fire department...and the guy whose house was on fire was running around saying I’ll pay! I’ll pay!
...and the fire guys were like, yeah, it doesn’t work like that. Welcome to the “free market”, bub.
Penny wise, pound foolish.
Thanks for the link, I had not seen that story. This is why some taxes are obligatory.
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Good reporting on this revelatory fiasco from the Texas Tribune.
The Texas legislature has passed on multiple opportunities to regulate the energy retailers. It's criminal that a consumer could be on a plan with so much risk and no explicit warning. Literally, it is criminal most places.
As for winterization of energy infrastructure, which Abbott said the state will do, it may be too expensive at this point to retrofit and cheaper to rebuild from scratch.
https://www.texastribune.org/2021/02/20/...winterize/
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pdq wrote:
It reminds me of when they made fire department coverage optional in rural Tennessee and some people said, yeah! Lower taxes! Stick it to the man!
...and then they had a fire and the fire trucks showed up, just to protect the houses next door who had paid the few bucks to the fire department...and the guy whose house was on fire was running around saying I’ll pay! I’ll pay!
...and the fire guys were like, yeah, it doesn’t work like that. Welcome to the “free market”, bub.
Penny wise, pound foolish.
“South Fulton's mayor said that the fire department can't let homeowners pay the fee on the spot, because the only people who would pay would be those whose homes are on fire.”
Modern conservatism at work.
My step father in law doesn’t insure his properties. “Just don’t start a fire” is his motto. When he went to get insurance for the house next door to where he lives, they turned him down as owning condemned buildings. And so now they rent it to a friend who doesn’t care about insurance.
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The other part of this, outside of the consumer regulatory end fiasco, is to learn to live with the disruption. I know, not a popular opinion. In this case, many of the disruptions may have been avoided by connecting to external grids, but not 100%. The new reality we are all living in, with a changing planet, can't be our immediate satisfaction, even if it's a bellwether for the future.
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I feel bad for them, but I think they took a calculated risk and lost.
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pdq wrote:
It reminds me of when they made fire department coverage optional in rural Tennessee and some people said, yeah! Lower taxes! Stick it to the man!
...and then they had a fire and the fire trucks showed up, just to protect the houses next door who had paid the few bucks to the fire department...and the guy whose house was on fire was running around saying I’ll pay! I’ll pay!
...and the fire guys were like, yeah, it doesn’t work like that. Welcome to the “free market”, bub.
Penny wise, pound foolish.
In the old days of REAL free market fire suppression (got this from a documentary about the 1906 SF quake), there used to be NO public fire depts, but there were private brigades. A guy would see a house on fire and make offers to the houses down the block. 'You're house is going to be next - wanna sell cheap?'. The sale is made, then the guy calls in his fire brigade to put out the fire.
Free markets work!
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space-time wrote:
I feel bad for them, but I think they took a calculated risk and lost.
I don't think they calculated anything. They took what looked like the easy, reasonable choice at that moment. No scenario whatsoever should have led to this. The government of Texas has failed the people. I guess If they calculated anything, it was the impression that voting for Republicans would somehow look out for their real and best interests. They lost that for sure. The state needs to step up asap.
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space-time wrote:
I feel bad for them, but I think they took a calculated risk and lost.
Kind of like buying a car without seatbelts.
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