Today's lesson: When government is involved, consumers always pay more for less.
Why would this be a surprise to consumers regarding energy? There are multiple examples in the past where government intervention and subsidies have made costs soar - think health care and higher education for example.
"In 2013, a German economist predicted that the economic value of solar would drop by a whopping 50% when it became just 15% of electricity and that the value of wind would decline 40% once it rose to 30% of electricity.
Six years later, the evidence that solar and wind are increasing electricity prices in the real world, often without reducing emissions, is piling up.
In 2017, The Los Angeles Times reported that California’s electricity prices had risen sharply, and hinted it might have to do with the deployment of renewables.
In 2018, I reported that renewables had contributed to electricity prices rising 50% in Germany and five times more in California than in the rest of the US despite generating just 17% of the state’s electricity.
And in April, a research institute at the University of Chicago led by a former Obama administration economist found solar and wind were making electricity significantly more expensive across the United States.
The cost to consumers of renewables has been staggeringly high."