But you can only reduce your demand up to a point. After that, you will need to pay the electricity no matter the price.
You're thinking of things like food. Demand for electricity is much more elastic.
Is like trying to live without air conditioners in Phoenix's summer or heaters in nordic countries at winter.
Before air conditioners came to people's homes in Phoenix, people would hang wet sheets up in their windows, or they would go to the air conditioned movie theaters to cool off.
Freedom is when I get to set the price. Then I pay whatever I like.
Like eBay, right? Where the final price is set based on how much you and the other bidders are willing to pay.
Well, that's exactly how smart meters work. Everyone bids on the price of electricity simply by using it, so everyone gets to help decide how much electricity ultimately costs for each time period.
Limiting available power based on economic power is as free as limiting it based on any kind of distinguishing aspect (location, education, marital status).
But the alternative, communism, just doesn't work very well.
You think just because the price is high, people stop wanting electricity?
Not exactly. When the price is high, people will want less of it.
Following that logic, we could say that people starving in third world countries are supply and demands way of solving the food shortage problem.
No, starvation in those countries is caused by political problems that prevent the free market from working.
But I would most likely not unplug my freezer, nor my fridge, nor change the time at which I cook, use my microwave, use my computer (because it's my primary form of income).
Would you put up some solar panels? Turn down the heater and wear a sweater? Turn the A/C up a couple of degrees?
A bakery is still going to bake X breads a day, they'll just raise the price...
But they won't pass 100% of the cost onto the consumer. Why? Because the cost increase will justify changing the way they do a few things, in order to save peak hour electricity. Maybe they'll shut down the oven during the peak period. Things like that.
Meanwhile, every electricity user will save money by not having to pay to build a new power plant just to provide enough additional electricity for the peak period.
So people will realize 100% of the benefit, while paying <100% of the cost, of peak hour pricing. This results in a net benefit.
...what if it's more profitable to turn food into fuel than sell it as food?
Then we should stop subsidizing fuel.
The solution to an energy shortage is to produce more energy...
You're only thinking from the supply side. It's a supply and demand problem, not just a supply problem.
People won't use less electricity if it costs more, because they're always billed at peak when they're at home. They have no real 'choice' in reducing consumption. Because they have no way to do laundry/cook/etc at 3am, when they're sleeping.
I do my laundry when I'm sleeping, because my washer has a timer on it. I can cook when I'm sleeping, because I can run the crock pot overnight. And if the peak happens when the sun is up, it might encourage me to put up some solar panels.
So not only does peak-hour pricing allow me to economize, it also saves us all the cost of building a new electrical plant just to provide enough additional electricity for the peak. So peak-hour pricing saves us money in two ways.
The alternative to charging what people are willing to pay (i.e. freedom) is, as you can read in the article, rationing (not freedom).
Uh. Smart meters don't fix shortages of electricity. All they do is cost the consumer more money when they're using it at peak.
You've just described how supply and demand prevents shortages, while claiming that it doesn't prevent shortages.
Think about it this way. Would you use less electricity if it cost more? If electricity cost enough, wouldn't it lower demand for electricity below the level of supply?
A shortage exists only when demand exceeds supply, and when that happens, it means the price is too low. Smart meters bring real-time price information to consumers, which helps reduce demand for electricity during peak times, and that eliminates the shortage.
East Japan entered its fifth day of power rationing on Friday, with no end to the planned blackouts in sight.
The problem described above (a shortage of electricity) is easily solved through the use of smart meters, where electricity prices adjust in real-time in response to demand in order to prevent demand from ever exceeding supply.
Empirically, if your theory were correct, European countries with high taxes on cigarettes would have low smoking rates, and yet they don't.
You need to provide more information before you can make that conclusion. For example, would their smoking rates be higher without the high taxes?
It's a fallacy to think that 100% of a tax gets passed down. If that were true, in 1946, when the top tax rate was 94%, then the government would have gotten around 94% of the money. And yet, it only got 20% of GDP or so.
Let me direct your attention to the Laffer Curve which explains this.
If paying full price is the cost of preventing large corps from dominating the internet landscape, Im all for it.
You're very generous with other people's money. But there must be a better way to prevent the problem you refer to than by impoverishing people. Perhaps by breaking up regional ISP monopolies?
Each time a customer clears the cash desk and the cashier has to wait for the next customer to arrive, time is lost.
This can be fixed. Queue up an extra customer at each cashier. If the current transaction takes longer than normal, the queued customer can switch to a different cashier, with very little time lost.
Yes, this can be offset by having a staff member playing shepherd, but that's extra expense for the store (and wouldn't it be better to have that employee actually manning a cash register?).
Sometimes supermarket style queues at cash registers go empty, and the cashier has to go shepherd customers from other queues. So for maximum efficiency, there still needs to be a shepherding role, whether it's a dedicated employee or whether each cashier plays that role from time to time.
Taken to the extreme, it can only lead to an absurd dystopia in which one third of your workforce operates during each of the three eight-hour shifts so that you keep your power and Internet bills down.
Is it really absurd to give people the freedom and ability to economize?
As I engineer an ISP network, I'll tell you up front that there is no such thing as 95 percent. Users ALWAYS will consume what is available.
That only happens when peak hour pricing is below the market clearing rate. With congestion pricing, the pipe will always be 95% full. If it's more than 95% full, the price is too low. If it's less than 95% full, the price is too high, or there's more capacity available than is needed.
We need keys for the "cents", "degree", "multiplication" and "division" symbols, and a shift-tab key to tab backwards through form fields.
And when web browsers properly implement multicolumn text (where columns are added and removed as needed based on the browser window size), we'll need "Page Left" and "Page Right" keys.
And how often do non-programmers need the "carot" symbol, the "pipe" symbol, or curly braces? Get a programmer's keyboard if you need those.
And it would be nice if Apple and Microsoft could agree on the meanings of the "Home" and "End" keys.
A megabyte at the hour of peak usage is worth much more than a megabyte in the wee hours. So one reason to charge more for megabytes from USB modems is because they are more likely to be used during business hours than iPhones.
It would be better to make the network completely device agnostic and instead have time-of-day per-megabyte pricing tiers, but that would add complexity.
Yes, it means the state might have to raise any fee that doesn't already cover the cost of the government service it's supposed to pay for. And the state might also have to raise the income tax, but that's a progressive tax.
So eliminating the state sales tax will make local businesses more competitive with Internet retailers while also eliminating a regressive tax. That to me sounds like a good deal for everyone.
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You're thinking of things like food. Demand for electricity is much more elastic.
Before air conditioners came to people's homes in Phoenix, people would hang wet sheets up in their windows, or they would go to the air conditioned movie theaters to cool off.
Like eBay, right? Where the final price is set based on how much you and the other bidders are willing to pay.
Well, that's exactly how smart meters work. Everyone bids on the price of electricity simply by using it, so everyone gets to help decide how much electricity ultimately costs for each time period.
But the alternative, communism, just doesn't work very well.
Not exactly. When the price is high, people will want less of it.
No, starvation in those countries is caused by political problems that prevent the free market from working.
Would you put up some solar panels? Turn down the heater and wear a sweater? Turn the A/C up a couple of degrees?
But they won't pass 100% of the cost onto the consumer. Why? Because the cost increase will justify changing the way they do a few things, in order to save peak hour electricity. Maybe they'll shut down the oven during the peak period. Things like that.
Meanwhile, every electricity user will save money by not having to pay to build a new power plant just to provide enough additional electricity for the peak period.
So people will realize 100% of the benefit, while paying <100% of the cost, of peak hour pricing. This results in a net benefit.
Then we should stop subsidizing fuel.
You're only thinking from the supply side. It's a supply and demand problem, not just a supply problem.
I do my laundry when I'm sleeping, because my washer has a timer on it. I can cook when I'm sleeping, because I can run the crock pot overnight. And if the peak happens when the sun is up, it might encourage me to put up some solar panels.
So not only does peak-hour pricing allow me to economize, it also saves us all the cost of building a new electrical plant just to provide enough additional electricity for the peak. So peak-hour pricing saves us money in two ways.
The alternative to charging what people are willing to pay (i.e. freedom) is, as you can read in the article, rationing (not freedom).
You've just described how supply and demand prevents shortages, while claiming that it doesn't prevent shortages.
Think about it this way. Would you use less electricity if it cost more? If electricity cost enough, wouldn't it lower demand for electricity below the level of supply?
A shortage exists only when demand exceeds supply, and when that happens, it means the price is too low. Smart meters bring real-time price information to consumers, which helps reduce demand for electricity during peak times, and that eliminates the shortage.
The problem described above (a shortage of electricity) is easily solved through the use of smart meters, where electricity prices adjust in real-time in response to demand in order to prevent demand from ever exceeding supply.
Does Japan not have smart meters yet?
You need to provide more information before you can make that conclusion. For example, would their smoking rates be higher without the high taxes?
Let me direct your attention to the Laffer Curve which explains this.
Stay off the roads when everyone else is trying to use them, and your toll will be lower. Maybe not 100% free, but close enough.
You're very generous with other people's money. But there must be a better way to prevent the problem you refer to than by impoverishing people. Perhaps by breaking up regional ISP monopolies?
That's an interesting loophole. It renders Net Neutrality meaningless, because an ISP can refuse you as a subscriber if you don't sign the agreement.
What if you don't care about Yahoo and just want a discount on your connection? Net Neutrality will prevent that, forcing you to pay full price.
Then if the company operates at a loss, should society support the company?
This can be fixed. Queue up an extra customer at each cashier. If the current transaction takes longer than normal, the queued customer can switch to a different cashier, with very little time lost.
Sometimes supermarket style queues at cash registers go empty, and the cashier has to go shepherd customers from other queues. So for maximum efficiency, there still needs to be a shepherding role, whether it's a dedicated employee or whether each cashier plays that role from time to time.
I thought what we want is Internet access and services for the lowest overall cost possible?
Sometimes a la carte pricing saves money. But Net Neutrality supporters want to take that freedom away from me.
Is it really absurd to give people the freedom and ability to economize?
That only happens when peak hour pricing is below the market clearing rate. With congestion pricing, the pipe will always be 95% full. If it's more than 95% full, the price is too low. If it's less than 95% full, the price is too high, or there's more capacity available than is needed.
Like I said, the * is used by programmers because the multiplication symbol doesn't exist on keyboards.
It's only antiquated because it's difficult to enter in.
No, the symbol used to indicate a fraction is the solidus.
No, that's 0 dollars and 0 cents.
That's just a workaround we've had to use because of the lack of a "degrees" key.
No, that's an asterisk used by programmers in place of the multiplication symbol.
No, that's a forward slash used by programmers in place of the division symbol.
Then they should put the × and ÷ there!
It's quite common for people to make fun of things they don't understand. Slashdot is often above that, but evidently not always.
We need keys for the "cents", "degree", "multiplication" and "division" symbols, and a shift-tab key to tab backwards through form fields.
And when web browsers properly implement multicolumn text (where columns are added and removed as needed based on the browser window size), we'll need "Page Left" and "Page Right" keys.
And how often do non-programmers need the "carot" symbol, the "pipe" symbol, or curly braces? Get a programmer's keyboard if you need those.
And it would be nice if Apple and Microsoft could agree on the meanings of the "Home" and "End" keys.
That sounds like a great opportunity for competitors!
A megabyte at the hour of peak usage is worth much more than a megabyte in the wee hours. So one reason to charge more for megabytes from USB modems is because they are more likely to be used during business hours than iPhones.
It would be better to make the network completely device agnostic and instead have time-of-day per-megabyte pricing tiers, but that would add complexity.
There must be a better way prevent huge, ugly messes than to support monopolies.
If it's already the government's job to break up monopolies, then why is Net Neutrality needed?
It's quite simple. Eliminate the state sales tax.
Yes, it means the state might have to raise any fee that doesn't already cover the cost of the government service it's supposed to pay for. And the state might also have to raise the income tax, but that's a progressive tax.
So eliminating the state sales tax will make local businesses more competitive with Internet retailers while also eliminating a regressive tax. That to me sounds like a good deal for everyone.