As I remember it from the California water crises some years back, a LOT of California water rights are owned by the original farms that first started using the

As I remember it from the California water crises some years back, a LOT of California water rights are owned by the original farms that first started using the water, and they pay very close to zero for using it. Thus we have rice farms in the desert and other such madness. This would actually be fine if "better" water users could buy those water rights from the rice farmer. The farmer would make a lot more money than growing rice could yield, and (say) LA could ease up on the lawn shaming. But for some ungodly reason, such trades are not legally possible, and the madness will continue.