Massachusetts ratepayers have a newfound interest in charges on their utility bills since the large price spikes of recent months.
Laurie Belsito
Posted inEnergy
What’s the pending climate bill going to cost us?
Presumably these many billions of dollars will all be paid for by the electricity users of Massachusetts, also known as ratepayers. Increasing electric bills is a highly regressive measure as it hits the poor the hardest, and the claim by the bill’s sponsors that the increase in electricity costs will be offset somewhat by a reduction in natural gas purchases rings hollow.
Posted inOpinion
Question 1 has negative unintended consequences
I’LL NEVER FORGET my experience as a first-time homeowner of an almost 200-year-old New England charmer. In our late 20s, and open to learning all that we could in order to be good stewards of a historic home, my husband and I were advised to have someone take a look at reinforcing an old floor […]
Posted inOpinion
Claims for millionaire tax don’t add up
AS IT MEETS in a constitutional convention on Wednesday, the Massachusetts Legislature has another opportunity to approve the so-called millionaire’s tax, paving the way for the measure to appear on the November 2022 ballot. This latest campaign to make the state’s flat tax into a graduated income tax would impose a 4 percent tax surcharge on […]
Posted inOpinion
TCI: Meager benefits, high costs
THE TRANSPORTATION AND CLIMATE INITIATIVE (TCI) bills itself as a regional collaboration designed to improve transportation, develop clean energy sources, and reduce carbon emissions from the transportation sector. To accomplish these goals, TCI proposes implementing a regional “cap and trade” scheme whereby a cap, established by individual states in collaboration with regional authorities, would be […]
Posted inOpinion
Mass. carbon tax: Poor bang for buck
ON THE MATTER of climate change, politicians have reached a point where they will throw anything they have at the problem without a thought to the economic consequences or, for that matter, the effects on climate change. Thus, we get unrealistic ideas such as the “Green New Deal” and the resulting talk about getting rid […]