The Big Squeeze

Rumor has it that natural gas prices are already heading for a 42% increase. If true, there will probably be a class action suit, but that won't help seniors caught in the squeeze. Electricity rates went up 19%, and although property tax remains level, voters in their wisdom removed the city senior exemption forcing many homesteaders to sell.

Sadly, the damage is not limited to seniors. It's economics 101. Increase the cost of critical necessities (infrastructure) and discretionary income suffers. Consumers are forced to buy cheaper and cheaper if at all. They drive an hour and a half to buy Chinese, and local shops close and  move on.

Not just a consumer issue, energy is a key factor of production. The economy is not only national, It's a local thing as well, and nothing is so local as energy. Gas, oil, propane, gasoline or electricity, it's the cost of doing business. Economics is productivity, and productivity requires the exploitation of a cheap, abundant, sustainable resource -- land, labor, capital, energy etc.

By allowing a sanctioned monopoly, in the form of a utility, to finance inefficiencies with price increases far beyond the inflation rate, and by legislatures selling out Alaska's abundant resources without insuring that abundance for Alaskans, we cripple our local economy and insure stagnation -- the big squeeze.