Raleigh, the city that I live in, recently implemented stage one water restrictions. This means I can water with a sprinkler once a week, and by hand with a hose twice a week.
This simplifies my life. Whereas I once had to be concerned about watering every other day, now I only need to be concerned about watering once a week.
Better yet, once my plants and grass die from lack of water, I won’t have to water at all. Thank you, City of Raleigh, for helping me simplify my schedule this way.
sar-casm [sahr-kaz-uh-m] –noun “harsh or bitter derision or irony”
I wonder what a good solution would be to this problem. From a pure economic perspective, the problem is that there’s a limited supply. The logical answer is that the price goes up when the supply is low, which naturally will curb demand. Some would then argue that people need water to live so the price shouldn’t be too high. But… if there’s truly not enough water for everyone, how else are we to determine who gets the water other than who’s willing to pay for it?
I guess I’ve never seen price controls work. And it seems that Raleigh and other governments that implement water restrictions are really implementing price controls by keeping the prices artificially low. Why not let the market figure it out, Raleigh? It seems that the market does a better job at figuring out the right price than a bunch of bureaucrat in the government.
Is there a better solution to this problem other than letting the market take care of it?