Video: The Perverse Incentives of Utility Companies

There are a lot of ways in which our political and economic system is set up to prevent effective environmental action of an type. It’s one of the reasons why I think we actually need “revolutionary” systemic change. As things stand, the most powerful entities in the world are fighting against climate action, which means that until we take their power away, we will not be able to change course. We might be able to slow down a touch, or make slight changes in direction, but everything about our world is designed to block radical change in a leftward direction. It’s pretty obvious that moving things to the right is easier at this point.

This video breaks down how that problem manifests with utility companies in the United States, and I have to say that while I knew the situation was bad, I didn’t know it was this bad. I think a key thing to understand going into this is that “The Free Market” has always been a myth. It never existed, and never could exist. Even if we reset everything to zero tomorrow, under the right-wing libertarian model, you’d quickly see people accumulating wealth and power, and using that to manipulate the market just as they do today. That means that from the beginning of capitalism, the boundaries, freedom, and incentives of “The Free Market” have always been set by the government, generally following the interests of the capitalist class.

With that as an introduction, the TL:DW of this video is that all of the profit incentives for utility companies, combined with corporate law, basically require them to oppose distributed power generation, renewable energy, grid maintenance, and a whole host of other things. The end result is that the incentive structure is set up based on the circumstances and thinking of the 1930s, and the U.S. government has become too dysfunctional to change course since then. This is one of many reasons why capitalism needs to be replaced with something that actually values life and freedom, if we want humanity to survive, which I do.