Would be nice if we could unfuck the US, also if we could take a bit of money from the military to get heat pumps and induction stoves, and just skip the gas
I agree on the gas for health reasons.
I really want an outdoor wok burner, because my induction stove just doesn’t get hot enough. I’m used to working with a professional stove that will go up to 700° F. The induction stove won’t get my wok above 500° F.
It’s expensive and not available yet, but this might do it: https://www.impulselabs.com/
It has a built in battery so it can have a higher peak power output without upgrading your electricity supply.
I have questions. They specifically say that once available it will run on a 120w or standard outlet, or low power 220w outlet. I don’t know that it would be possible to hit 700° F without a high power 220 outlet.
Oh sorry we’re going to have to triple your rates. What? No not for anyone else just you. Nothing to do with your feedback though, we value that!
They’re not allowed to but they definitely can. They’ll probably get away with it unpunished too, the American “justice” system being what it is…
It’s not just the US. I had issues with my supplier a couple of years ago where they randomly changed the supply address of my account then opened additional accounts in my name without informing me or asking for consent, and after I called them to sort their shit they added a random over 2 grand charge to my account and expected me to pay my neighbour’s bill for some reason. I ended up with around 15 calls to them where every time they claimed to be confused how that could have happened and promised an immediate fix which never materialised.
When I was finally able to raise a complaint with the ombudsman the supplier didn’t even bother to respond. For all that blatant fraud they got a slap on the wrist. Their only penalty was that they had to credit a tiny amount to my account (I think it was ~£100) and remove the other fraudulent charges and accounts.
The worst part is I know for a fact they’re pulling that shit with people unable or unwilling to fight back. I dread to think how much of their profit is from just straight-up scamming people.
Which is to say
depending on jurisdiction they can just arbitrarily raise rates
It is what it was, before the whole privitization thing
Oh shit you’re right. There’s no such thing as a societal need, everything ought to be turned into for-profit endeavors that enrich private equity! Don’t just defund the police, let them compete in the free market! Let’s see who has the best ideas! Let’s see if we can create a quadrillionaire! Because isn’t the invisible hand of the market such an inherently appealing idea that we should ignore its failures? Isn’t it fun to think of an economic theory as a great filter?
I was shooting heroin and reading “The Fountainhead” in the front seat of my privately owned police cruiser when a call came in. I put a quarter in the radio to activate it. It was the chief.
“Bad news, detective. We got a situation.”
“What? Is the mayor trying to ban trans fats again?”
“Worse. Somebody just stole four hundred and forty-seven million dollars’ worth of bitcoins.”
The heroin needle practically fell out of my arm. “What kind of monster would do something like that? Bitcoins are the ultimate currency: virtual, anonymous, stateless. They represent true economic freedom, not subject to arbitrary manipulation by any government. Do we have any leads?”
“Not yet. But mark my words: we’re going to figure out who did this and we’re going to take them down … provided someone pays us a fair market rate to do so.”
“Easy, chief,” I said. “Any rate the market offers is, by definition, fair.”
He laughed. “That’s why you’re the best I got, Lisowski. Now you get out there and find those bitcoins.”
“Don’t worry,” I said. “I’m on it.”
I put a quarter in the siren. Ten minutes later, I was on the scene. It was a normal office building, strangled on all sides by public sidewalks. I hopped over them and went inside.
“Home Depot™ Presents the Police!®” I said, flashing my badge and my gun and a small picture of Ron Paul. “Nobody move unless you want to!” They didn’t.
“Now, which one of you punks is going to pay me to investigate this crime?” No one spoke up.
“Come on,” I said. “Don’t you all understand that the protection of private property is the foundation of all personal liberty?”
It didn’t seem like they did.
“Seriously, guys. Without a strong economic motivator, I’m just going to stand here and not solve this case. Cash is fine, but I prefer being paid in gold bullion or autographed Penn Jillette posters.”
Would you say rampant inefficiencies and cronyism are also present in the private side of things as well though?
I can certainly imagine that the rich owner of a company is more likely to take a service contract with his rich buddy than with the newbie on the block, and nobody will do anything about it because private.
Then in terms of inefficiencies, the only thing a private company seems to be able to do efficiently is take money off you, not deliver their service or even customer service.
At least state services have the opportunity to hold those in charge responsible, if the systems put in place work for the people. In many countries however, this is not the case.
Therefore it seems like turning companies private is just another bad option. The actual, and perhaps impossible, fix is to resolve the issues in our governing bodies such that our leaders are held accountable.
Yes. Services like gas and water are natural monopolies - it doesn’t make sense to roll out two or three separate lots of distribution pipes, so you always just have one service available to you. The best option is to have them as government owned services.
How do you send different supplier’s water down the same pipes while making sure customers get the supplier they’re paying for’s water?
And yet, I can choose from dozens of different energy companies for electricity and gas.
You’re choosing from vendors to deal with the regional vendor. You’re just paying someone to pay the company in your area. The company you pay in this scenario literally offers you zero value. They simply exist to extract money from you.
Alternatively, these services could be provided to you at a lower cost as part of your annual tax bill under a collaborative cooperative.
DOZENS? Dozens. For real, dozens??? Please list for me every utility company that will actually provide electricity service to your home. If it’s actually more than two I will donate $25 to a charity of your choice right now. Not ones that operate in your state/county, but ones that will actually service your home. No cap, my Visa is ready. I’ll post the receipt.
Um… I’m perfectly OK with a “monopoly” for my fire fighting services. Why would I feel differently for my utilities services?
If the government decides to privatize utilities like electricity/gas or whatever, then sure it is freedom for some rich business owners to open up new businesses. However, this also results in those utilities becoming profit driven (as opposed to being for the public), and literally everyone in the country having to pay much more than they were paying previously.
My country had electricity privatized around 4 years ago, and in result we have to pay a lot more, not to mention about numerous fraud cases that were all over the news during and after the privatization period.
If you think that rich business owners being able to open up a couple of business at the expense of fucking over the public is a good thing and being against it is some weird hexbear delusion, then I’d advise you to get out of the libertarian bubble and look at the real world instead.
Please enlighten me on how I can start a utilities company? Make sure you give me details on how I can maximize profits to my shareholders while fucking over my customers.
Or maybe I should start a non-profit utilities company, and the cost of your services is subsidized by taxpayers’ money. That way, I don’t have to constantly chase capitalism and make life better for my community instead of my shareholders.
Nothing says punk more than enabling for profit corporations to hold sole ownership of the utilities that we need to continue living in a bare minimum standard of living. /s
We’re talking about basic utilities though. Do you think the average person can start or run such a business? I’m honestly interested in the answer.
Those things are natural monopolies, so the choice isn’t monopoly vs free-market it’s profit-driven-monopoly vs public-good-driven-monopoly.
Unlike what’s said by the mindless pseudo-Economics bollocks a lot of prople have been indoctrinated with, the upsides for consumers of a Free Market only exist in the subset of markets were there are natural conditions for high levels of competition - which is most definitelly not gas provision to households - and even in those there are still systemic problems such as negative externalities that require some level of regulation.
Distribution is a natural monopoly. Supply is not. Every supplier is putting the same, standardized product in the pipes. If they put a cubic foot in, and I take a cubic foot out, I can call them my supplier, even if they are putting it into the pipeline a thousand miles away from me and there is zero chance I will ever be burning the actual gas they supplied.
Indeed, and separating distribution from production is how decent competition is introduced in such markets (there are still barriers to entry related to infrastructure, but they’re nowhere as bad as the ones when the distribution infrastructure is owned by the gas company).
However, often that’s not how things are in the markets for gas, power and water supply as well as internet access.
Not only that but in markets were those things are separate the supply companies will try as hard as they can to get their hands on the distribution side (for obvious reasons), and, well, neoliberal politicians are usually happy to let them. The natural tendency in an unregulated market in those things is for sooner or later to end up in a winner-takes-all situation were one of the suppliers got it’s hands on the distribution side and used it to create a monopoly position, if only locally.
It’s a funny thing about the so-called “Free Market” in domains were it is possible for businesses to directly or indirectly create the conditions for natural monopolies: without actual intervention from an outside strong and independent actor (i.e. a governmental power with the will to intervene) such markets sooner or later end up naturally not being free anymore.
Market actors activelly and constantly seek a dominant position so if there are conditions for a monopoly (the most dominant position there is) one will eventually succeed and if there aren’t but there are for the next best thing (a cartel) a handful of them will eventually succeed.
