• Bademantel@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    This has little to do with where you’re from. It’s just neoliberal rhetoric. Having a public energy sector would be beneficial in the long run and would reduce what we have to pay for it. Right now the earnings are privatized in most places.

    • FireRetardant@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      My area privatized the publicly owned electricity provider and since prices started going up they then had to implement rebates to bring bills down a bit. Effectively a roundabout way to move public funds from paying for the actual infrastructure into subsidizing corporate profits instead

      • Bademantel@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Exactly. Privatize the profits and socialize the costs. What a brilliant system. Unfortunately it benefits only a small handful while everyone else picks up the tab.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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      6 hours ago

      Having a public energy sector would be beneficial in the long run and would reduce what we have to pay for it.

      A well-run public energy sector, certainly. Idk what we’d end up with given the most recent rotation of people in charge.

      The state does have an incentive to keep consumer costs low in a way the private sector does not. But state officials also traditionally do a bad job of maintaining and expanding utilities to match consumer demand.

      The end result tends to be low end user prices at the expense of reliable distribution and surplus volume.

    • deHaga@feddit.uk
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      20 minutes ago

      It’s not rhetoric. It’s economics 101. Opportunity cost.

      A mixture of private and public is best.

      Edit. A mixture allows more spend on more things. Govts can’t sell infinite debt

        • deHaga@feddit.uk
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          1 hour ago

          Opportunity cost. If you spend money on one thing, it means you can’t spend it on something else

      • Bademantel@lemmy.world
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        6 hours ago

        Thanks professor. Do you know private debt and state debt are hardly the same? Have you considered the opportunity cost of not having public energy, therefore losing potential “earnings” to private investors? Or are you telling me next that rich people are a necessity as well? Is trickle-down part of this course or do I have to wait for 201?