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Politics : High Tolerance Plasticity -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Zeuspaul who wrote (3629)	4/22/2001 8:06:56 AM
From: whitepine	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 23153

[my original question] Would you kindly define a "just and reasonable price"? Your reply >If you are thirsty and need a glass of water and I am selling it and it costs me a buck...then a buck and a half or two would be reasonable. If I sell it to you for three bucks I am pushing it. If I sell it to you for five or ten dollars and I sell it to the guy at the back door for fifty cents then that is not just and it is not reasonable.< You have not defined “just and reasonable price,” though you have submitted a subjective example. If I am thirsty, I have alternatives. I can get my own water from a number of natural sources, or I might seek a lower price from a competitor, or I might drink something else. You may ask any price, but I do not have to buy your water. If you are in the water-selling business, your goal is to make money. You have not invested and worked at this business for altruistic reasons. Taking your example a step further. Assume it is a hot day. I am willing to buy your water @ $2/glass. Thousands of others are also willing to buy your water. In fact, the line is so long that it stretches over the horizon. You only have 20 gallons to sell. Who should receive the relatively scarce water and how many glasses should each receive? The old, the sick, those with “excess” incomes, green people, purple people, ecologists, or party members? If you don’t use the price system, by what criteria will you ration your scarce supply? Prejudice or principle? Since you have not offered a definition about how a just price is defined, or how it can be determined, I think it fair to understand that your criteria for distribution is prejudice, however noble your values. The example is not stretched compared to power. Your reply neglects three major items that affect the current state of affairs. 1. The population in CA and the US has increased. The relative and absolute demand for power has increased. If per-capita consumption levels remain unchanged, more power must be produced. You find it hard to argue with success, but someone must invest to produce more power to meet the increasing demands, or there will be an insufficient supply. Without the potential of profit, who will invest in new power plants, gas pipelines, and infrastructure? Would you? Will the state government? 2. Alternatively, if aggregate demand for power is frozen, then per-capita consumption must fall. If one does not use the price system to signal consumers to reduce their consumption, some method must be employed to enforce conservation. When the governmental authority arrives at your door and pulls three plugs, will you object? Will the bureaucrat or policeman apply the rules of conservation equally to all? If so, how does one define ‘equally’? Unless the price system is used, I see no alternative. 3. You neglect to discuss the problem of supply and the cost to produce power. If the cost of finding, transporting, and distributing new natural gas supplies (and electricity) increases, who should bear these costs? Drilling is not a free service. Pipelines are not created by the stroke of FERC’s pen. Who will pay for these real costs/investments? If natural gas/electricity becomes too expensive, you are free to put a windmill or solar panel on your roof. There are many alternatives. That insufficient rainfall in the PacNW has exacerbated the problem is not a conspiracy. If the cost to produce power exceeds your idea of a just price, what do you suggest? I fail to understand how one can abolish the concept of scarcity through government fiat. There is no free lunch. You wrote>If you find something that is broken by all means search for a solution...[ below] just be careful you don't make it worse.[] If systems are working it is generally not a good idea to monkey around with them...especially on a large scale.< That the economics of power generation and distribution was working is only part of the problem. It was only working in a static world. Power production, population increases, and the costs of producing power are not constants. You wrote>You just can't build a power plant anywhere as there are limited optimum sites. I don't want my neighbor firing up a diesel generator as his dog is loud enough.< Yes, it seems few in CA want a power plant built in their neighborhood or even in their state. What do you say to those who live where you do intend to build the power plant? What if they object to polluting their environment so that Californian’s can enjoy a pollution-free paradise? You wrote>If there is one good path over the mountain pass for power lines...why build three in the name of competition? Build one and regulate the use as you have essentially given someone monopolistic control.< You say ‘build one.’ Who will build it? Who will pay for it? If you don’t offer a profit incentive, how do you propose this might be accomplished? If you are create a monopoly, fine. If you regulate the price of energy, fine. However, if the price is too low, no company will invest. Without an incentive, if CA wants the power, it can create its own socialist bureaucracy. You wrote>What about toll roads? Should the owners be allowed to triple the tolls on hot days when everyone wants to go to the beach? Why not build two toll roads to increase the competition? In California a toll road operator sued the state to prevent the construction of a new lane...they didn't want the competition.< A. People are not forced to take the toll road; there are alternatives. If the price is too high, people have choices. B. Under what terms and set of rights was the original monopoly granted? If an error was made in the contract and the public now wants a new system, pay the owners for their investment and create as many or few toll roads as you like. You wrote>IMO price caps for the current situation are in order. I would think the supporters of free market juice would be for price caps. Without out some type of control things will get out of hand and reregulation is assured.< ...the free market mantra of the nineties... This deregulation thing is utter failure... The whole free market thing is nonsense. The electric market is no where near free. Eliminate all of the long term contracts and sell all of the power including federal power from the Hoover dam through an unrestricted transmission system and then let's talk about a free market. The solution to this mess is really quite simple. It just takes leadership.< A. Which is it, a free market or no free market? You can’t have it both ways. B. ‘Solution … is really quite simple.’ Yes, but this flies in the face of your own admonition above [**] that I have noted. You wrote> …Bush snickers to himself as he allows the rape of California…< Hyperbole is no substitute for reasoned analysis. Perhaps the problem arises from so many who have become prisoners of their own myths.