11–20 of 281 posts
This is a trend. PG&E in CA started it and now Texas... I guess climate change is risky business after all.
Or you could say that CA and TX are demonstrating that deregulation is a failed strategy. "Vital infrastructure" and "market driven" are rarely a good match.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Privatize the profits and socialize the losses
That's not what bankruptcy is? Unless you consider creditors and equity holders "society".
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Or you could say that CA and TX are demonstrating that deregulation is a failed strategy. "Vital infrastructure" and "market driven" are rarely a good match.
To say CA is "deregulated" is kind of a bastardization of the term.
Vital infrastructure, practically by definition, is unprofitable. That's not a good match to profit driven markets.
Elon Musk making the move to Texas specifically to avoid the regulation that would have helped stop this from happening, would be kicking himself right now if he was in any way affected by this or consistent in his beliefs.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Privatize the profits and socialize the losses
That's not what bankruptcy is? Unless you consider creditors and equity holders "society".
Isnt this a common tactic, to declare bankruptcy in face of large liabilities?
That's kind of what bankruptcy is for, overtly. It's not like some kind of clever hack.
I’ve been a creditor on receiverships like this and it’s painful - in my view, if you run a business into the ground, you, your agents, and entities controlled by you or in which you have a substantial interest should be disbarred from operating an enterprise for at least five years. You definitely shouldn’t be permitted to continue in the same enterprise.
Elon Musk making the move to Texas specifically to avoid the regulation that would have helped stop this from happening, would be kicking himself right now if he was in any way affected by this or consistent in his beliefs.
Only difference is Elon Musk is smart enough not to foot gun himself when he actually asserts his power.
This is a trend. PG&E in CA started it and now Texas... I guess climate change is risky business after all.
Or you could say that CA and TX are demonstrating that deregulation is a failed strategy. "Vital infrastructure" and "market driven" are rarely a good match.
I think the issues around power utilities are more to do with a lack of competition, and legislation that creates perverse incentives. (I don't know what the current perverse incentives are, but at least as of 2010, an energy startup founder said[1] that power companies were legislated monopolies that were "restrained to charge a price only up to a certain regulated return on their capital", which meant it was "in the utility’s interest to buy the most capital intensive equipment that the regulatory commission will allow".)
Can you legislate a monopoly and write enough careful regulations to make it do what you want without giving it perverse incentives that will cause some disasters here and there? I doubt this has been solved even in the absence of regulatory capture.
[1] https://daniellefong.com/2010/02/11/how-law-shapes-the-busin...