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Politics : Politics of Energy -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?


To: RetiredNow who wrote (4703)1/30/2009 6:39:44 PM
From: TimF  Respond to of 86356
 
Not true. Better Place is building a global company out of it.

If Better Place is building a global company from alternate energy subsidies it doesn't support your argument at all.

1 - Building a company is rarely a case of rapid payback.

2 - Building a company, doesn't mean that the company has to be profitable.

3 - Building a profitable company, doesn't mean the subsidies paid back at all, let alone rapidly. Hand me enough cash, and I can build a global company. Keep the subsidies going, and I might make a good profit. If the subsidies are large enough I could even have high costs, and low quality, and still make a profit. Sure they pay well for the person receiving the subsidies. Welfare checks are "profitable" to those who receive them as well.

4 - Building a global company that rapidly receives profits, that exceed the amount of the subsidy, doesn't mean that the subsidies where necessarily well applies. The money might have had a higher rate of return elsewhere.

5 - 3-5 years isn't rapid in the same sense as the IPhone payback. The subsidy for the Iphone is probably less than a years worth of payments on the cell plan.

6 - "some as short as 3-5 years", even if one is to accept all the criteria and definitions to get such a result (and these criteria and definitions are often very problematic), doesn't imply "all withing 3-5 years", or "most withing 3-5 years".

7 - One example (even if your example was a good one, which I doubt) doesn't cut it. I said "doesn't apply to most alternative energy subsidies" not " doesn't apply to any alternative energy subsidies.