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| Danger Will Robinson and us |
© 2015 Michael Swickard, Ph.D. "It
is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer or the baker that we
expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interests." Adam Smith,
1776
We need the robot in the television
series Lost in Space to say,
"Danger Will Robinson" when we start playing with what made our
nation strong and wealthy. More so, people in our society do not realize what
keeps each of us alive and therefore they often take actions that are adverse
to our own survival.
Example: no one wants to pay more
for electricity. You never see people holding signs, "Please increase my energy
costs." But people have not really thought this through.
El Paso Electric wants an increase
to cover that they increased their generating ability. Protestors say the
government needs to punish this energy utility.
El Paso Electric along with some
other energy utilities were on the hot seat, wait, it was a cold seat when a
cold wave hit New Mexico in February 2011. What's really bad were the many
people who existed for days without power. Their pipes froze and burst. That
was the start of bad moments.
Fast forward to today when the rate
increase protestors want the power in their homes without paying for the
increased capacity. They accuse the companies providing coal, gas and oil or
taking advantage of them. Yet without power they would die within a week, if
that.
In our modern world we must have
power to transport our food, pump our water, heat or cool our homes and to
travel. Yet the majority of Americans seem to loath the energy producers.
Several people have told me that the proposed El Paso Electric increase is
theft. Really? Whom is stealing from whom?
Most of the bounty in my life has
been provided by strangers for the purpose of each having more for themselves.
I drive a truck made by people who did not know, love and care for me. They were
working because they wanted more. Sure they were professional so I love my
truck but none of us knew each other.
Some say gas prices are high because
of the greedy oil industry. However, the record profits made by oil companies
were exceeded 250 percent by the taxes on those companies. The government made
2.5 times as much as the oil companies with you at the pump paying both the
profit and taxes.
Further, those are just the overt
taxes. Everyone who works to provide fuel, from the researchers and developers
to the drillers and refiners to the transporters and stores, is taxed. You pay
both overt and covert taxes when you buy gasoline.
We know that the high price of gas
is caused entirely by our government not doing the right things to increase
supply. It is stupidity, not greed, that makes energy expensive for Americans.
How much profit should people make?
There is a fuel stop in the middle of nowhere between Phoenix and Los Angeles.
It has a sign, "This gas is expensive. If you don’t need the gas, don’t
buy it." Would those drivers be better off if no gas was sold?
Pushing a car by hand for 50 miles
is at the least daunting. After the first couple of miles of pushing by hand I
think those drivers would gladly pay $100 per gallon.
Everything is regulated by price in
our country. If hamburgers were a quarter, more people would eat them. Gas
costs what people will pay and no more.
It does not matter to me if you do
not want more. Some people live on the land, foregoing electricity, using only
what they need. I would not stop them, but I do not want them to impose their
lifestyle on me. Our country has been and is very prosperous. Let's keep it
that way.
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