This feels like kinda of a useless comparison if we don't know about the tax rates they pay, cost of capital, adjusting for geographic location and local regulations etc. I.e. the largest increase was seen in NY where it is really expensive to do anything and high taxes.

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Hnrobert42 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

Not to mention quality of service. Sure, electricity is electricity. Water is water.

But outages, outage response times, infrastructure, investments, etc. are the other side if the equation.

I have no idea. Maybe investor-owned utilities also provide worse service. However, without accounting for that, the article's claims don't mean much.

	▲	maerF0x0 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> electricity is electricity. Water is water. except its completely not: electricity has stability, availability during peak loads, robustness under inclement weather etc. Water has purity, safety, and flavor. (Austin water in the fall tastes like leaves :gross:)

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nodrog3000 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Yup, tax exceptions, cheaper financing or even government financing. It's like letting the referees play the game and then pointing out that they make more free throws.

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zoeysmithe 4 hours ago | parent [-]

Removing the rent-seeking middle-man class generally brings in savings. Same with healthcare.

Also the "refs" should be in charge. That is to say the working class are the refs and they should be able to build infrastructure without the capital owning class inserting itself as a rent-seeker between them and these services.

	▲	nodrog3000 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Your free to go start a worker owned company and compete in the market, good luck.

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tyromaniac 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Based on the chart it seems than Maine was by far the highest.