Open Wide and Say Aaa

I do not envision electricity rates going down or staying flat going forward. Do you? If you do, I'd be curious to know why you think so. Smart Grid? Renewables? Cheaper natural gas? A drop in consumer demand?

SMUD raised rates this year in no small part but to keep our credit rating high, so that our borrowing costs for capital work remains low.

Think about this. We raised rates simply to maintain our credit rating...a rating from the same agencies that four years ago rated all those subprime mortgages "triple A." Aaa. AA+. Aa1. Even though 73% of all securities underwritten as Aaa in 2006 are now considered worthless, SMUD finds it economically advantageous to stroke the dicks of these same credit rating agencies and raise rates to the ratepayers so these agencies will rate us "high grade." This way, others will be enticed to buy our bonds -- just so we can continue to provide power to our own customers.

This is one more reason why you pay more for your electricity, why you are losing just a little bit more of your productive output to the "financial sector," an industry comprised of a whole class of people who produce nothing and who's job it is to fuck you out of just a little bit more of your productive output. They take a slice, commercial bankers take a slice, insurance agents take a slice, brokers take a slice, and investment bankers take a slice.

Didn't realize that when you pay your power bill you are subsidizing all these leeches, too, eh? Yes you are, and you will until the end of time, because we now live in nothing but a service economy. We only take in each other's laundry while we don't actually do the laundry. We outsource that labor to Guatemalans. Half of us make our living selling laundry soap and cling-free fabric softeners, while the other half make our living insuring the workers and selling them housal units they can't afford. While the rest of the world is hard at work producing the garments and the washing machines, they will soon wise up and produce their own soap and their own fabric softeners. We'll wonder why our economy can't recover, wonder "why do they hate us," wonder why we can't find jobs other than retail sales associates or hamburger hut food purveyors, and wonder why gasoline keeps going up in price.

We'll wonder why.