Publicly-Owned Utilities and the Recession

I have already commented on the local water utility and their interesting ideas as to what constitutes "investing in the community". However, today I discovered they decided to kick it up a notch.

The Scranton Times-Tribune reports today that, as the third-costliest water utility in the state of PA, they are petitioning the PUC for a rate hike. Of almost 14%. Which would bring us up to second-costliest!

They suggest that it's because they've invested *so* much money into the local infrastructure. But there's also a completely separate charge on the bill for "Distribution Systems Improvement". And rates got hiked 9% in 2007.

I'll have more on this later, but I mainly just wanted to get the links bookmarked for handy reference.

Write the PUC and your state representatives, dammit.

Hershey's sending more jobs to Mexico

As a Pennsylvania citizen, I've always had a soft spot for Hershey's chocolate.

Turns out the relentless flow of globalization is causing more jobs to get shipped down to Mexico.

Boycott Peppermint Patties, 5th Avenue, Zagnut and Jolly Ranchers.

Production of York Peppermint Patties and other candy brands is coming to an end at The Hershey Co. plant in Reading.

After 23 years in Reading, the chocolate maker is closing the plant Friday and moving production to a new factory it has built in Monterey, Mexico. Hershey (nyse: HSY - news - people ) says it will mean the loss of about 260 jobs in the southeastern Pennsylvania city.

The plant also makes 5th Avenue and Zagnut candy bars and Jolly Rancher hard candies.

Boxee Box

Posted for convenient reference.

Link

Krugman on the Fed and "Clap Louder"

Krugman posts today about how in 2005 the Fed were not listening to any negative news relating to securitization.

I'm rather astonished by the sheer magnitude of the groupthink that must have been happening in policy-making circles during the go-go years.

I'm an IT guy by trade, so it's not my job to worry about economics/finance/public policy, but I am an interested observer. There seemed to be an awful lot of flashing lights and alerts out there for quite some time. There was also long time when you could both believe that Roubini was over-the-top yet still be very concerned about the future.

I'm sure that most Fed members were probably not visiting Calculated Risk every day, and I'm not even sure if the blog existed then. But way back in that same year, The Economist came right out and called "the biggest bubble in history", specifically in housing, but it also suggested that we had a Global bubble across all assets, IIRC. This is The Economist, so it's not that you had to be a Bush-hating fringe Lefty to read this.

This whole situation reminds me of the old saw: "Experience is the ability to recognize that you've made this same mistake before."