Ex-Post Pricing

The California ISO has seemingly forever used ex-post pricing to determine the price of electricity after the supply of real-time energy. This, to some, is economic impurity...instantaneous exchange at a contractually determined price is most ideal.

You can perhaps understand why it was so important for me to cleave the whole idea of marketing electricity, to get back to the fundamentals of engineering the delivery. Delivery must occur, regardless of how some group of over educated dolts decide how to market it. You can be assured, 98% assured, that the engineering of market based mechanisms are designed largely to fuck you out of your money, because these people are employed to make themselves and others richer at your expense. Not you.

I was one of them. A big reason my mortgage is nearly paid off is because the electric ratepayers of California unwittingly subsidized my bloated ISO salary for eight years. Rest assured, I didn't give a damn about what rates you paid to support my lifestyle. Thanks to you, I have a boat, three cars, and a quarter acre stuffed with mindless consumer consumption trophies. I can sit here, dry and comfortable, and blog about excessive American lifestyles and the shitty landscapes we've created because of the creature comforts afforded me by my earlier consumer life and that I still reside directly in the middle of suburbia.

It may be impossible for you to brush my own hypocrisy aside. Truth is, I'm a late arrival. I only recently acquired a taste for less, and found it to be so much more rewarding. I am in the significant minority, but that's how I've always found myself, an outsider. I rarely identify with the group. I enjoy the company of many, many individuals, but I don't give a shit about the groups they identify with.

I might enjoy the company of any particular individual, but once lumped into the consumer group, or the mortgage defaultee group, or the Christian group, I take issue. I revolt. My current revulsion is toward the group of people (a growing number) who are financially challenged and whose burden will be eased with Obama's direct bailout subsidies. Remember, those designing the bailouts don't give a shit about the bottom rung schleps. This eighty billion will be used to compensate the lenders, to bribe them into accepting easier financial terms for those millions of distressed "underwater" borrowers. These borrowers, on the other hand, all of them, will now get ex-post mortgage protections. Bad interest rate? We'll change it after the fact. Bad purchase price? We'll negotiate it down. Bad payment? We'll modify it such that it's now "affordable" -- no more than 28% of your take home pay.

We will tax the prudent home buyer (me) to subsidize the imprudent home buyer (you).

Now, keep in mind, I'm very favorable towards many facets of wealth distribution, because I'm becoming convinced that the true wealth of our society can be measured by how well we take care of all citizens. But this is complete horseshit, folks. There is no mandatory requirement that we all be homeowners. I am willing to subsidize the ability of less fortunate people to acquire shelter, health care, and the like...but subsidizing their bad economic decisions and to keep them as homeowners? Fuck that.

This is no different, no different! than propagating the sad American ethos of unearned riches, perpetual leisure, and unearned entitlements.