🚀 go-pugleaf

John Higdon wrote:
> > A: 50 units @ $0.10
> > B: 45 units @ $0.12
> > C:  5 units @ $0.20
> >
> > As currently structured all 100 units are purchased at $0.20
> > giving A an unexpected profit of $5.00 and B $3.60.
> >
> > It is one thing for seller A to look at the market and see that
> > C was able to sell at a higher price and raise his to $0.19
> > in hopes of getting more profit, it is another for the government
> > to mandate the extra profit regardless of the offered price!
> 
> What should possibly happen is to take A and B at $0.12 and tell C to take a
> hike. That is a perfectly legitimate action.

It certainly is, but in reality I don't think it is going to be feasible
to do that to any great extent.  Natural-gas fired capacity, for
example, is very expensive to operate given current natural gas prices
(hundreds of dollars per mWh in recent months) and represents about 30%
of California's total capacity.  If you set the price below that
threshold, natural gas plants are better off shutting down than
producing.  Given that about half of the demand is exempt from rolling
blackouts, rest of us would be subject to rolling blackouts an average
of 60% of the time (probably more during periods of high demand). 
That's really just not feasible.