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We Found the Hidden Cost of Data Centers. It's in Your Electric Bill [video]

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156 points xbmcuser | 1 comments | 04 Sep 25 12:33 UTC | HN request time: 0.197s | source
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Jcampuzano2 ◴[04 Sep 25 13:30 UTC] No.45127075[source]▶
Clear example of privatization of everything... until its the big corporations who need to get something done - then its socialism in disguise. And of course they hide all the deals behind closed doors so their customers can't see who all, and how much they're subsidizing.

If there is a sudden increase in demand/supply issues due to large corporations they should be the ones to subsidize the bill. I'd argue in the communities this affects they should be forced to cover for everyone who lives in the area for materially making their lives worse.

Not to mention utility companies should be forced to be transparent in the pricing/deals they make with tech companies. They are likely just luring them in with a deal and passing off the rest to their customers so they still don't lose out in the short term. They want the best of both worlds - still making all the same profits short term by passing on to customers while getting the long term lock-in for these data centers.

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abvdasker ◴[04 Sep 25 14:00 UTC] No.45127376[source]▶
> socialism in disguise

I really dislike this kind of rhetoric. This has nothing to do with socialism. Corporations profiting from externalities and pushing costs onto regular workers is just capitalism. If you have a problem with it, maybe you have a problem with the inevitable concentrations of wealth and power which result from capitalism.

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jimbokun ◴[04 Sep 25 14:28 UTC] No.45127662[source]▶
That's a strange definition of capitalism you're using.

Most people use capitalism to describe a system where people trade goods and services with as little interference from government as possible.

In this case, the government has written laws in a way that indirectly transfers wealth from consumers to large corporations.

Saying that such laws are "inevitable" in any conceivable capitalist system is unfalsifiable and adds little to the discussion.

I think calling it "crony capitalism" to make it clear that it's the undue influence of capital on government specifically causing the problem here lends more clarity to the discussion.

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1. dragonwriter ◴[04 Sep 25 14:48 UTC] No.45127925[source]▶
> Most people use capitalism to describe a system where people trade goods and services with as little interference from government as possible.

“Capitalism” is a term coined for the dominant system of the industrialized West in the mid-19th Century and is defined by the specific orientation of property rights in that system around the private and marketable ownership of the non-financial means of production (the “capital” in “capitalism”), and the way in which the system was fundamentally structured around—and institutions within it, including government, invariably served the interests of—the owners of that capital, who formed its ruling class, displacing the landed hereditary aristocracy of the preceding systems.

While the dominant politico-economic systems of the developed world have evolved somewhat since then, with modern mixed economies having structures in place mitigate some of the adverse impacts the original system for which thr label “capitalism” was created for has on the vast majority of the population that is not major capital owners, it retains the basic property structure and resulting class heirarchy of the original “capitalism”, and neither it nor the original tended tof eatite annabsence of regulation of commerce.

> I think calling it "crony capitalism" to make it clear that it's the undue influence of capital on government specifically causing the problem here lends more clarity to the discussion.

The commanding and undue influence of capital on all of society, government and otherwise, is literally the feature for which critics of the then-dominant system coined the term “capitalism” to refer to that system. It doesn’t need an extra qualifier for that.