Was streaming 4KQ Brisbane and they mentioned in the news that electric rates are taking a big hike. Here in the USA we pay about 13 cents a kilowatt-hour on average, plus a fee the power companies charge for the service of sending a guy out to read the meter and mail the bill. Someone conned the public utilities boards here to let them do that... What are electric rates like in Australia? Heard that it's more expensive than USA rates. Much higher, then you won't be able to afford to operate the vintage radios....

I could get political here (as well as others). However it is pretty obvious that we are being "screwed".

Service charge (varies slightly) around 65 cents per day
and power around 34 cents per KW and one wonders why on a pension, we have difficulties making ends meet.

Marc

4KQ Brisbane used to be MOR format in the 70s and they would switch to their suburban Garden City studios 12:00pm weekdays where they had Euphonics Strain-Gauge phono cartridges/tonearms. I could hear the difference in music character over their main City studios' sound that used Magnetic cartridges (the Strain-Gauge would sound more pure and separate the vocalist & the various instruments better). The broadcast Techs liked them mainly because they were Line Level Out with no RIAA preamp required.

There's another brand of Strain-Gauge available even today:
http://www.stereophile.com/content/soundsmith-strain-gauge-sg-200-phono-cartridge-system

In the late 70s, Queensland Govt power station union workers would switch off power without warning as a means of industrial action.

Conservative State Prem. Joh Peterson was embarrassed by this anarchy.

Until, finally, in consultation with legal experts, he found he could fire the union members en masse!

Instant Joy:
No more random blackouts for residential & business.

Instant Shock:
No more comfy jobs at this Public-Sector- Monopoly for these goons.

I remember back to the 1970s when everyone went on strike for no good reason and the term 'secondary boycott' was more common than eating breakfast. First the bus drivers would want a pay rise and would go on strike until the Public Transport Commission agreed to cough up. When the train drivers found that rail patronage had risen due to the bus strike they'd go on strike too, followed by ferry masters. The only people benefitting were cabbies, who would be granted ministerial permission to double-hire during the disputes.

Anyone remember the bread strikes, milk strikes, BLF and Painters & Dockers thuggery, Storeman & Packers sit-ins and the infamous Truckies blockades on the Hume Highway near Yass? Any truckie that tried driving through the blockade got bashed and his rig torched.

Then if that wasn't bad enough the station workers at the almighty Electricity Commission of NSW would go on strike for extra money and conditions which would result in rolling blackouts across the state.

And all of this was just in NSW. No doubt there would have been duplicate performances in other states.

All we have to worry about these days is drive-by shootings and wars between drug lords and bikie gangs - timid stuff, really.

My electric light bill came in the other day. I am on 62.8c per day for the connection charge and 24.4c per kWh for the first 1000kWh and 25.5c per kWh thereafter. I get a 10% discount for paying by the due date and my provider Red Energy (Snowy Hydro) is one of the only mobs that take American Express so I can't complain too much.

That said, I do remember a time when electric light bills were much more reasonable and that was when the generation, distribution and retailing was all in government hands. All corporatisation and privatisation has done is raise prices to satisfy shareholders and give everyone grief with reliability issues. We did much better with Elcom and the county councils.

My electric light bill came in the other day

I haven't heard the term "electric light bill" since my grandparents passed away in the 1960s. They were raised in houses that had no power points, so the bill was just for lighting.

"Service charge (varies slightly) around 65 cents per day
and power around 34 cents per KW"

Wow! what do they use for fuel at the power plants, paper money? Gold bricks won't burn...

That would explain why, back in 1986, the room key to my hotel room in Cairns needed to be inserted into a slot to activate the air conditioning, so it would not be running when you're out.

And I though I was getting a little gouged by the $3 a month service charge up here...

Last I heard, the Aussie dollar was trading for around 95 cents American.

As others have said it used to be reasonable and it is today because "reasonable" is now the market price which is honest. Under the former socialist model, you may not be paying what it actually costs to produce (bloated staffing, bureaucrats setting their compensation by fiat, public sector "unions" running amok)

In other words, the price in the old days was probably subsidised

And not only that, they were probably neglecting the infrastructure & modernisation ( like Chernobyl ).

Which helps explain why sooner or later you better start to run it like a business.

I disagree with the anology that government-owned pertains to neglect, though it depends on what we are talking about. That said, there are so many examples of where infrastructure and services have been privatised in Australia only to see the punters experience the exact opposite.

Let's start with Melbourne's suburban rail system. It went from a service run at cost with low fares subsidised by taxpayers to a privately run lost cause with pathetic rolling stock and revenue protection officers that Victorians nickname The Gestapo because they have a reputation for being heavy-handed overlords.

Then there is Victoria's privatised electricity grid. Again, prices rose after privatisation to cover the need for the corporate entities to make a profit, at the time, largely for foreign companies that bought in. The occurrences of blackouts.

The same happened in NSW with the abolition of the Electricity Commission (Elcom) and the County Councils which retailed the distributed power. During the 1970s and 1980s the government invested heavily in huge power stations to replace smaller ones like Balmain, Pyrmont and Bunnerong. After that investment in higher capacity almost ceased and we got to the stage where transformers were blowing up in the summer heat and many of those that survived had to be cooled with garden hoses. My previous job was Chief Engineer at a private hospital and I still remember the night I was called in when half the Gladesville/Hunters Hill/Boronia Park area was blacked out for 13 hours due to a transformer that could no longer handle the load placed on it. Fortunately the hospital's emergency generator ran on the town gas supply so I didn't have to keep topping it up with diesel.

Not everything that is privatised becomes a train wreck but there is enough significant damage done to warrant a review on what gets privatised and what remains controlled by government. Governments here once controlled health funds, banks, building societies, brickworks, totalisator betting, wine making and the like. These are things that have worked well under private ownership. Things that have proven not to are utilities, telecommunications and transport services.

Personally, I would prefer to forego the ability to choose an electricity provider and pay a lower price, with any profits made invested in higher capacity and higher reliability instead of going into a shareholder's pocket.

Personally, I would prefer to forego the ability to choose an electricity provider and pay a lower price, with any profits made invested in higher capacity and higher reliability instead of going into a shareholder's pocket.

On balance, so would I.

Look what happened to NSW water infrastructure when Carr decided that the Water Board should pay the government a "dividend" instead of saving surpluses for infrastructure maintenance and renewal.

The public utilities as formerly structured were perhaps not glowing examples of corporate efficiency, and could be captive of unions, but they did provide good continuity, were locally accessible and their infrastructure was maintained. And I would guess that the engineers in charge were proud of their occupations and reputations.

Look what happened to NSW water infrastructure when Carr decided that the Water Board should pay the government a "dividend" instead of saving surpluses for infrastructure maintenance and renewal.

Yes, exactly. Many days each year the traffic reports include the latest water main that has burst, sending millions of litres of water into the air and obstructing traffic.

One of the faithful promises of the previous socialist government lead by Bob Carr/Morris Iemma/Nathan Rees/Kristina Keneally (yeah, state Labor governments go through boatloads of leaders too!) was to levy every water user a sum of money to pay for the complete replacement of Sydney's water mains and the previous conservative government lead by Nick Greiner had a vision of putting every power line in the state underground, again for a one-off fee charged to every electricity customer. Neither project ever got off the ground although it is taken for granted that power distribution to new estates is underground.

With regards to the dividend required of the Water Board, the three major retailers, Energy Australia, Integral Energy and Country Energy were required to do this too before they were flogged off for seven and six by the previous government. The LV network owners, Ausgrid, Essential Energy and Endeavour Energy are still required to pay a dividend and this is law. I am not sure if the same is required of the HV network owner, Transgrid or the three generating entities, Macquarie, Delta and Eraring.

That is some good info & stories.

Here's a good one:
There are a couple of very large water supply pipes under Manhattan that date way back in the 20th century. Their condition is critical, as crucial shut-off points don't work (it would be destructive to attempt to operate these rusted up mech's)

What to do?
The City bureaucrats can palm off the utility to one of those gigantic French Multinational Water Companies. New York has the Need; the French have the Greed.

I haven't heard the term "electric light bill" since my grandparents passed away in the 1960s.

I've heard it used a bit. The really old one is "gaslight bill" which stems back to the days of gasoliers. I've worked in numerous places where the old gas lights remain fitted to buildings.

One of these buildings is Graythwaite, formerly owned by Sir Thomas Dibbs and later owned by the Department of Health as a convalescent home for returned servicemen.

Another was one of the gatekeeper's cottages at the Old Gladesville Hospital - the gas lights there were still in service in 1994 when I finished working there, even though the cottage was electrified in the 1930s.

Ever worked on buildings where they pulled wires through existing 3/8"ID gas piping?

Or gone to the Philippines or Brazil where some outlets have 110v and others are 220v? Which ones? Better check first!

I've worked in numerous places where the old gas lights remain fitted to buildings.

In the 1908s I owned a Federation style house which still had a gaslight fitting in one bedroom that was very noticeably different from the rest of the place. I gather that the previous elderly owner was infirm and that was the room she occupied for a long time and so it was never redecorated.

The fitting was hinged just like this one, except it wasn't chromed:

http://ebid.s3.amazonaws.com/upload_big/0/0/1/1180903490-13579-0.jpg.

The lead piping ran under the wall plaster up to the roof where it had been torn off.