The Joys of Privatization

Water rates in the United States are 62% more then they were in 2016, well above the rate of inflation.

Maybe selling off government owned water systems to private for a few magic beans was not a good idea.

US households are paying 62% more for drinking water than they did a decade ago – outpacing inflation, grocery prices and household incomes, according to a new study.

Food & Water Watch, a Washington DC-based non-profit, analyzed 2025 billing data from the 500 largest community water systems in the US, which together serve about 155 million people, or 45% of the country’s population. The analysis compared current rates with data from a similar Food & Water Watch survey conducted in 2015. The study does not include wastewater or storm water charges, which are often billed separately from drinking water service.

In 2025, the average household using 60,000 gallons of water paid $531 for drinking water service, according to the study. However, costs varied widely, with annual bills ranging from $133 at the cheapest system to $1,416 at the most expensive.

Water prices rose 1.6 times faster than overall inflation between 2015 and 2025. Consumer prices increased 39% during that period, compared with a 62% jump in water bills, according to the study. Water costs also rose more than twice as fast as groceries, which increased 30%, and eggs, which rose 28%.

………

The study also found a major disparity between publicly owned and for-profit water systems.

Corporate-owned utilities charged the average household $823 a year, compared with $494 for publicly owned systems – a difference of $329, or 67%. Corporate systems accounted for just 11% of the 500 systems the study analyzed but represented 44% of the 25 most expensive systems. The study added that 70% of the top 10 were owned by for-profit corporations.

Outsourcing a public to a bunch of contemptible greed-head sociopaths was such a good idea.

Gee, Ya Think?

Following reports of massive noise, an inexhaustible demand for water, and massive pollution, polling is now showing that data centers are about as popular as hemorrhoids.

Well, I am shocked by this. 

A silent war is playing out across rural America.

Residents are packing themselves into local county meetings in incredible numbers and calling on their representatives to oppose gargantuan data center projects, developments that could cause electricity prices to spike, drain water supplies, and generate copious amounts of noise.

Farmers are being hailed as heroes for rejecting millions of dollars to turn their land into data centers, while claims of the facilities bringing jobs to the area are being met with incredulity and frustration.

In short, the AI backlash has grown immensely over the past year or so — and the latest numbers put the trend in stark relief.

According to a new Heatmap poll, at least seven in ten Americans would oppose a data center being built near their home. That’s a seismic shift from last September, when a similar poll found only 42 percent of Americans were opposed.

By February, the same question resulted in just 51 percent saying they were against having a data center project near their home, indicating that the opposition grew substantially in a strikingly short period of time.

“The public has swung 49 points against data centers in just nine months, underscoring the heightened political salience of the facilities and the AI industry that they embody,” Heatmap noted in in its writeup.

Gee, why would the public object to projects that pollute their air, take their water, and throw them out of work?  I have no clue.