Submitted by Cute_Platypus_5989 t3_11axypk in Pennsylvania
I mean an extra charge on natural gas because the weather was too nice. One of the highest gas taxes in the country. People at every Walmart trying to scam you into changing electric companies. I am truly curious as to how people on fixed income survive, and why voters don't demand something be done.
Voters do try to change things.... but nearly half the population votes for the party that keeps doing it
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I don't know but we do have this body appointed by the governor that oversees it all.
Not the gas tax, though.
There's nothing funnier than the people driving a 12mpg brodozer complaining about the gas tax.
You can't choose whether or not to heat your house, but you have complete control over what it costs to gas your shitheap up.
Fr tho. They’re also causing the problem of diesel and truck prices to be so high too. Don’t drive one unless you absolutely need to use it
Right?
It’s not always better with the municipally owned systems.
Often times the rates are lower but that is for political reasons while the systems deteriorate.
It's all good. Just crazy that a politically purple state would have such strong republican views on infrastructure.
With natural gas isn’t the residential rate in PA pretty much middle of the pack in the US?
As for the gasoline tax that’s the result of borrowing against those funds for decades and never putting the money into the repairs and updates early enough. Now instead of fixing bridges they have to totally replace them.
That’s government, not corporations.
Natural gas rates are 7% above national average. Even though Pennsylvania produces the 2nd most natural gas in the USA only Texas produces more. Corporation's are the ones who "lobby" to have governments spend a certain way.
By PUC regulation the distribution utility makes no money on the gas they distribute. They pass it through at cost. The other charges on the bill are based on convincing the PUC that the improvements they are making are necessary for continued safe operation.
Unfortunately we have a lot of old pipes in the ground that need updated. That costs money.
Utility isn't supposed to profit on supply, but insiders and other companies associated with possibly could. I suspect that's the situation with PPL. Something that should be investigated.
Very odd with how PPL default supply rate went from middle of the pack to the highest so rapidly this past June followed by another sizeable increase again in December.
As for utility infrastructure, much needs repair, but adding surcharges is shady verses simply raising the distribution rate directly. Maybe surcharging is a legitimate approach, but have my doubts. PUC should do more to protect both utilities and consumers.
I’m in western PA. Our Penn Power rates have had similar increases in the last year or so. It’s all tied to the price of natural gas since we generate a lot of electricity with natural gas.
The war in Ukraine created a spike in global gas prices. That flowed through to your utility bills. Both electric and gas. Gas has cratered lately due to the relatively warm winter. Downward adjustments are coming.
Surcharges and weather normalization factors are all allowable and still regulated by the PUC. Utilities are switching to these since usage is dropping due to gains in efficiency. All of the infrastructure still needs to be paid for and charges that are based on consumption are too variable. So they switch to surcharges and normalization factors to try to stabilize revenue.
The US has some of the lowest fixed monthly customer charges in the world. Places in Europe charge $20-$30 a month or more as a base charge because of this same issue.
Nationally we are shutting down the cheapest most reliable source of generation in nuclear. That isn’t helping costs either.
I'm confused how does the company survive if they make no money?
I said they sell the gas at cost. I didn’t say they made no money.
Utilities operate on an allowable rate of return on invested capital on the allowable rate base. Invested capital to a gas utility is made up of pipes, pumping stations, valves, storage facilities, buildings and vehicles, computer systems, etc.
In a complex calculation, these assets depreciate a little of their value each year throughout their useful life. The role of the PUC is to set the allowable return on that asset base, then the utility needs to manage rates to that return in consultation with the PUC on a periodic basis.
But the gas is straight pass through at cost. They make their money on the fixed fee charged monthly and other charges on the bill (distribution charges, special riders as agreed by the PUC, etc).
Natural Gas prices have plunged recently. The commodity charges get adjusted by the PUC quarterly to make sure there is no profit on the gas. A downward adjustment is coming soon depending on your utility’s schedule.
Really because a huge chunk of the DOT funds goes to pay for pensions for state employees.
That’s not a corporation.
Also do you think those natural gas rates are higher because of democratic or Republican actions in PA?
The cheapest natural gas isn’t found in blue states, that’s for sure.
> Really because a huge chunk of the DOT funds goes to pay for pensions for state employees.
What is the actual percentage? Other reasons might be because we have an elderly population that doesn’t pay much income tax.
> Also do you think those natural gas rates are higher because of democratic or Republican actions in PA?
democrats have a crazy philosophy of not destroying land and ecosystems in the name of exporting cheap energy out of state
https://commodity.com/blog/natural-gas-states/
>. The cheapest natural gas isn’t found in blue states, that’s for sure.
New Mexico? Colorado?
Have you been living under a rock?
The big debate over charging municipalities without police for state police coverage is all premised on being able to pay for state police without dipping into the fuel tax revenues as they have for years now.
Maybe try a couple states that are a bit bluer and not a thousand miles away. New York? Massachusetts? PA is cheaper than both.
>. Have you been living under a rock?
Yes that’s where all the gas is.
> The big debate over charging municipalities without police for state police coverage is all premised on being able to pay for state police without filling into the fuel tax revenues as they have for years now.
What does that have to do with pensions?
> Maybe try a couple states that are a bit bluer and not a thousand miles away. New York? Massachusetts? PA is cheaper than both.
I was listing states that have locally sourced cheap gas, and are more blue than PA. You listed blue states that have no local geological deposits of gas so I’m not sure what your trying to prove.
State Police collect pensions. Lots of pensions.
State police are around ten percent of pendot budget. Demcorats have tried to get rural republicans to pay their fair share of state police funding but conservatives only believe in self sufficiency for other people and not themselves. If the state had a higher income tax or more working age people, this would be less of an issue. Pa also has three times as many miles of state road as New York. We even have twice as many as ohio.
I think the outrage belongs to the legendary gas tax installed by the Corbett era (republican) and increased two more times during the Wolfe (democrat) era. It’s the added tax to the gas pump. It was touted as a tax to fix our roads and bridges when they passed it… instead 4.3 billion went to the pensions of the state police. 4.3 billion.
>I think the outrage belongs to the legendary gas tax installed by the Corbett era (republican) and increased two more times during the Wolfe (democrat) era.
Wolfe didn’t increase the gas tax. Those were automatic increases from the Corbett law
> It’s the added tax to the gas pump. It was touted as a tax to fix our roads and bridges when they passed it… instead 4.3 billion went to the pensions of the state police. 4.3 billion.
That’s not entirely accurate. The $4.3b is the entire state police budget over several years. Democrats proposed changing the law to charge rural areas state police user fees. Regardless, that 4.3b is only ten percent of the entire pendot budget so it isn’t the only factor affecting pendot budget issues. Some issues are
decades of lower taxes and deferred maintenance has created a massive backlog
more state miles of roads per capita than almost every other state in the country
located in climate zone that has some of the most frequent freeze thaw cycles leading to defrosting roads
State is especially susceptible to landslides that destroy road
Anemic population growth but same amount of roads
Elderly population doesn’t pay income tax.
I know Wolfe didn’t increase it bc it was set to increase the two times during his tenure bc of Corbett. Wolfe also could’ve put a stop to it.
Wolfe can’t rewrite the law. If the automatic increases are written into the law by the legislature and the law is signed by a previous governor, he has no authority to stop the increase without breaking the law.
Also 4.3 billion went to pensions and not the roads/bridges.
That $4.3 billion was for operations of state police and not just retirees pensions. It was over ten years and amounted to only ten percent of pendot s budget over that time period
You have proof about the budget? When they did the audit a few years back that’s when they discovered the 4.3 billion went to pensions. That was in the papers, radio, and news. It was a pretty big story that upset a lot. As for Wolfe re writing laws. Understand that. He could’ve brought it out more into a public focus and put the lime light on his fellow Republican lawmakers who chose to make such a crappy tax.
So the issue is if you promote something. Say it’s going for one thing. Let’s say for example the roads. Then you turn around and use it for another thing… wouldn’t that fall under a false tense? A type of fraud to the public?
I never said it wasnt fraudulent. I’m just pointing out it was only one small part of a giant mess
How come Vermont has stellar roads? Shoot just driving over the border on route 29 you can feel the massive difference. I think they might get a little bit more extreme weather then we do in Pa?
PA has more freeze thaw cycles than Vermont. Places that stay below freezing most of winter actually have less road damage than places that fluctuate constantly near the freezing point.
Purple nationally but the GOP has controlled the government at the state level for decades.
Yep. In the last thirty years, we have had one year of Democrat unified government (1993), compared to eleven years of Republican unified government (1995-2002, 2011-2013).
The governor's seat is a tossup but the general assembly (particularly the Senate) has been quite safe for Republicans.
Right! One of PA's cities got in serious trouble for looting money saved up for sewer infrastructure maintenance and replacement and misappropriation of those funds into the general fund to address a budget shortfall...for decades. PA's utilities and municipalities need to start budgeting for 30 years on the future.
What can we honestly do? They control us. We are sheep.
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Demand... what exactly? PA voters put these people in charge who voted on all of this... the lack of a severance tax, the gas tax, the electricity de-regulation, the school taxes and allocation... this is what 4 decades of republican control looks like.
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Republicans have been in control of PA Congress (with very minor blips) since the 70's, and nearly every thing we strongly dislike was done by them to benefit corporations over people
Amen!
Wasn't it Tom Ridge who deregulated the electric in PA?
‘Allow’? I asked them to stop but they didn’t
I love how anyone who thinks the cost are to high or even questions the corporate world here gets down voted. It's pretty funny. I guess the thought is do as you are told here.
What are you talking about? I mostly see people responding with substantive comments about the topic you raised... You just wanted people to pat you on the back and be mad with you instead?
Bemoaning down votes is against sub rules
I hear ya. I literally blew a gasket at my UGI Weather Normalization Adjustment Fee of $15 dollars last month. Getting charged for NOT using a service is worthy of getting the pitchforks out.
I don't know about anyone else but I never got the notice to vote on any of the price or tax increases, so as a citizen of PA I didn't have much of a choice.
Im shocked by the property taxes
Yes they were quite high as well. Also all the different fees to drive are quite high
All of that is the result of inflation. And higher interest rates to combat inflation.
Property taxes go to pay for bonds (with high interest rates now) that are needed to do any municipal projects.
Frankly it’s too convoluted and with too little gain for a regular person to really blast through. The electric bill is $12 higher per month than it should be. Ok, that sucks, but that’s not rising to the top of my list of things to deal with any time soon.
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Have you lived in a state other than PA? Genuine question.
Yes multiple as a matter of fact.
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We’re citizens of the United States, or if an LPR, or undocumented, whatever country they are citizens of. We are residents of PA
It’s not like we can do anything.
PA drinking water is some of the cheapest in the country (bottom 1/3)...for now.
I’m curious what side of the state the poster is from. If you compare things looking to the Northeast, then no we aren’t terribly expensive. Is you look south west then, yeah I can see that impression.
> One of the highest gas taxes in the country.
Last I checked, gasoline that goes into your car isn't a utility.
I think people are getting confused with the pump gas tax (which blows) and the service fees our natural gas companies (example ugi) is tacking on the bills bc (I’m theorizing here so bare with me) they need money to pay for infrastructure upgrades… even though they raised rates in the past and made their share holders happy they did nothing for their service.
compared to Utah electricity and gas are cheap, so I have no idea what you mean. I don't know after the run up in prices the last couple years, but here was about 30% cheaper.
Utah has the 5th lowest price for natural gas in the USA. So you are incorrect there
I paid my gas bill. I know what it was.
enemy_of_your_enema t1_j9v0k3t wrote
The "weather normalization fee" that Philly's gas company and some others charged generated a lot of negative press and an outcry from the PA Office of Consumer Advocate. It's currently under dispute at the PUC. Here's an article from last fall about it.
The companies at Walmart trying to "scam you into changing electric companies" are actually trying to get you to switch electric suppliers. It's usually not a scam, but sometimes it is. Your electric utility only distributes energy, not generates it. By default, the power you get from them they source from power plants at the lowest cost they can get reliable power. You can opt to get your power from another company if you want it to be all renewable or pick another price. You can certainly get cheaper power by shopping around. I've done it. But go to www.papowerswitch.com to see all your options and their terms rather than talking to some salesman at Walmart.
But the overall reason our utilities are too high is that we have old, inefficient housing stock and powerful utilities. Utilities are supposed to be regulated by the PUC, who balances their interests with ratepayer interests, but it's far easier for utilities to influence the PUC commissioners, the Governor who appoints them, and the legislators who confirm them, than it is for us to do that. In other words, regulatory capture.