4 ms·

How will you define "everyone"? Will the government find out how many people live in a certain household and use that to arrive at a "basic personal amount" of

How will you define "everyone"? Will the government find out how many people live in a certain household and use that to arrive at a "basic personal amount" of water?

slavik81 12y ago
There's lots of options, but a possible method would be to give a coupon code to individuals who ask for one. They could then apply it against the bill for their household. It's also not too expensive to err on the safe side and give out a generous personal amount. In the quantities that an individual uses, water is pretty darn cheap.
- richthegeek 12y ago
  What quantifies as cheap? In the UK (central Manchester) we pay about ~£300 (~$500) per person per year.
  - deleted 12y ago
    [deleted]
  - slavik81 12y ago
    I should probably have specified marginal cost. If I did my math right, it's a fraction of a cent per litre on the margin. The fixed costs are a large part of that total price.
rmc 12y ago
Yes? "Want your free water supply for X people? Prove X to us"
- mikegriff 12y ago
  That's pretty much what is happening now in Ireland. Irish Water is asking for PPS numbers for all the children in a household and for the main householder. PPS numbers are similar to Social Security numbers in the US. At the moment Irish Water is a semi state body, but there are large fears that it will be sold off to a private company in a few years, along with the PPS numbers and details of everyone in Ireland. There was a large demonstration against it last weekend [1] [1] http://www.thejournal.ie/water-charge-protest-in-dublin-1718557-Oct2014/ http://www.thejournal.ie/water-charge-protest-in-dublin-1718...
  - merrua 12y ago
    The fear might be strengthened by the fact someone admitted that was the plan and it went on wikileaks
  - rmc 12y ago
    Yup. Irish person here. Hence how I know. Now, I'm not saying that the way IW is doing it well, or that PPS numbers are a good approach. But the idea that "How will they know?" is some sort of unanswerable, impossible question is silly.
TheCoelacanth 12y ago
The amount of water that people need for basic personal use is so small that they could just take your word on how many people are in a household. The payoff for fraud is just so low that it wouldn't be worth it. An acre-foot of water, the amount that some farmers are paying $20 for, is 325,000 gallons. At that price, a typical persons usage would be about $0.20/month. Raising that number by 10x, which is roughly the price San Diego pays for water, each person would be using about $2 of water per month. Even assuming the worst case, that 100% of the water had to be produced by desalination costing $2000 per acre-foot, that would only be $20 per person per month.

How will you define "everyone"? Will the government find out how many people live in a certain household and use that to arrive at a "basic personal amount" of water?

slavik81 12y ago

There's lots of options, but a possible method would be to give a coupon code to individuals who ask for one. They could then apply it against the bill for their household. It's also not too expensive to err on the safe side and give out a generous personal amount. In the quantities that an individual uses, water is pretty darn cheap.

richthegeek 12y ago
What quantifies as cheap? In the UK (central Manchester) we pay about ~£300 (~$500) per person per year.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- slavik81 12y ago
  I should probably have specified marginal cost. If I did my math right, it's a fraction of a cent per litre on the margin. The fixed costs are a large part of that total price.

rmc 12y ago

Yes? "Want your free water supply for X people? Prove X to us"

mikegriff 12y ago
That's pretty much what is happening now in Ireland. Irish Water is asking for PPS numbers for all the children in a household and for the main householder. PPS numbers are similar to Social Security numbers in the US. At the moment Irish Water is a semi state body, but there are large fears that it will be sold off to a private company in a few years, along with the PPS numbers and details of everyone in Ireland. There was a large demonstration against it last weekend [1] [1] http://www.thejournal.ie/water-charge-protest-in-dublin-1718557-Oct2014/ http://www.thejournal.ie/water-charge-protest-in-dublin-1718...
- merrua 12y ago
  The fear might be strengthened by the fact someone admitted that was the plan and it went on wikileaks
- rmc 12y ago
  Yup. Irish person here. Hence how I know. Now, I'm not saying that the way IW is doing it well, or that PPS numbers are a good approach. But the idea that "How will they know?" is some sort of unanswerable, impossible question is silly.

TheCoelacanth 12y ago

The amount of water that people need for basic personal use is so small that they could just take your word on how many people are in a household. The payoff for fraud is just so low that it wouldn't be worth it. An acre-foot of water, the amount that some farmers are paying $20 for, is 325,000 gallons. At that price, a typical persons usage would be about $0.20/month. Raising that number by 10x, which is roughly the price San Diego pays for water, each person would be using about $2 of water per month. Even assuming the worst case, that 100% of the water had to be produced by desalination costing $2000 per acre-foot, that would only be $20 per person per month.