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

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (3639)	4/22/2001 5:45:31 PM
From: Gottfried	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 23153

Ed, one of your finest posts ever! Does anyone know if there is a state where full deregulation exists? Partial deregulation? Does it work? Gottfried

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (3639)	4/22/2001 6:15:31 PM
From: BCherry168	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 23153

Ed, a good, balanced response. Although I tend to agree with Whitepine, you do state the other side reasonably. One question is, when you say "In answer to Whitepine's pivotal question, a fair price will be a price that would allow energy companies to make a profit that would encourage the allocation of capital to the energy sector and reward investors for their risk. It would not be a price that would result in a shock to the economy with effects that far exceeded the benefits that might be realized by pumping that extra capital into the energy coffers. In other words, even though the tail might have the power to wag the dog, the government would not allow it." who do you intend to make the decision as to what amount of profit would induce people to take the investment risks associated with providing energy to people at a price they want to pay? I think that is the question: Who decides? Some would have the government do this. That has resulted in California being in the shape it is in. Now California, having royally screwed it up, wants the rest of the country to bail them out. That leads to the next question: Why should we? And another: At what price? Interesting discussion. Pretty much delineates the differences between free market capitalism and socialism.

To: cnyndwllr who wrote (3639)	4/22/2001 7:01:55 PM
From: Zeuspaul	Respond to of 23153

I'm all for deregulation whenever possible. The thought of beaurocrats having control over anything, much less anything as important as energy is frightening. On the other hand, the thought of placing total control of a necessary resource in the hands of a few very large corporations is equally scary. Competition between public and private entities is healthy. If either gains the upper hand abuses occur. Bureaucrats is a broad term...I presume we mean government paid workers or civil service workers. There are abuses in the civil service system. Civil protects the good as well as the bad. There are abuses in the private system. How many civil service workers does it take to watch a guy working in a ditch? How many private workers does it take to watch a guy working in a ditch when a contract job moves to time and materials? I have seen publicly run facilities move to private control followed by a deterioration of the facility. Upkeep and maintenance are less important than making a buck. As in the past I believe it is important to maintain power production facilities by both private and public entities. We all benefit from the accomplishments of the NASA bureaucrats. The citizens of LA benefit from the accomplishments of the LADWP. Given the choice I believe most businesses in CA would want to buy their juice from the bureaucrats at the LADWP. The answer appears obvious, there will be free market pricing but not to the point that the prices will be allowed to interfere with the basic functioning of the economy. We need to distinguish between wholesale and retail and cost based and market based. The lines aren't easily drawn. Are you proposing the power from the Hoover dam be sold in the free market? Are you proposing the BPA power be sold in the free market? Federal tax dollars constructed the dams with federal resources. All tax payers should be entitled to a piece of the pie. The free market sees no boundaries. California power producers are free to sell their juice to other states and other states are free to sell the power to California. In this new free market California wouldn't have to build any power plants. California should be able to out bid most of its neighbors. If it is cheaper to build a power plant in Utah due to fewer air pollution requirements then the plants will be built in Utah. We already know we can outbid the aluminum producers in the northwest so you can kiss them good bye. The historical answer has been a hybrid free market-government regulated system. In California the "deregualtion" was in reality an attempt to move more towards free market and away from government regulation. More like radical surgery. California disassembled the utility structure. A move towards the free market would have been the way to go. The utilities should have been left in tact. Independent power producers should prove their muster just like the regulated utility structure did. In fact small independent power producers are the ones that have provided the growth in capacity in recent years. It is the large power producers that received the spoils of the misguided policy makers that are center to the energy problems in California. If the existing structure was so inefficient and doomed to failure then the new independents shouldn't have needed any help. Assuming the independent power producers needed a kick start...why not..go for it...give them some incentives but let them compete and prove themselves. As a side note, I do agree with all of the criticism of the California legislature and both governors, Republican and Democratic, one for his role in helping to create this and one for his role in refusing to face it. It is interesting that the state referred to sometimes as the "socialist" state, was actually leading the way in terms of deregulation. If it hadn't led the way then one of our other states would likely have stumbled and we would be talking about how stupid they were. I don't have the answers, but neither do those who want to let the "market" control this near term scarcity. Agreed on the politicians past and present. You have to throw in industry and the utilities too...the impetus for change was industry's desire for lower cost energy...the politicians just implemented what they were told to do with utility support. You are giving the politicians too much credit for being creative. Most if not all of the criticism of California and the calls for California to pay market rates for electricity come from people who have regulated cost based power. I believe PA is the only state with deregulated power and it is not yet completely deregulated. PA utilities are being forced to take the customers that left the utility for the alternatives...and the utilities are forced to sell the power to these customers at a loss. The primary difference between the PA plan and the California plan is PA did not require their utilities to sell their power plants. Zeuspaul