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Comment by mpettitt | Hacker News Reader

As someone in the UK, it seems insane that cutting off domestic water is even allowed. It's considered a basic right, and even during droughts, the water companies have to supply a basic level to everyone. (https://www.citizensadvice.org.uk/consumer/water/water-suppl...)

You can cut off water to commercial premises for non payment, but that doesn't seem to be what's happening here.

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Welcome to America, where money trumps Human Rights.

What would your solution be to people not paying their water bill which helps recover the various costs of providing it? Let everyone eventually realize they don’t have to pay and go bankrupt so then nobody has access to it? Not disagreeing that water is a human right, but you need to draw a line somewhere, nothing is free.

There are a variety of mechanisms available to fund water access including taxes, and access fees, and govt re-imbursement. As the cost to the government is undoubtedly higher to provide bottled water to affected households that cannot pay or deal with the hospital bills for dehydration, it makes fiscal sense to simply keep the water on.

In Massachusetts electric companies are prohibited from cutting power 9 months out of the year for similar reasons - cutting electric heating in -20 F would introduce other costs in addition to the moral obligations.

Basic. Human. Right. You provide it no matter what, and if most people won't pay despite your best efforts, you subsidize it.

Yeah, the typical default solution is to just have the government pay for it.

From an economics standpoint I think the government has little incentive to ensure water quality because there's no competitor to take their business. Just look at Flint. Also once you start subsidizing, what stops people from abusing the water supply? If I'm not paying for the water bill, I won't care to self-regulate the amount I use which puts the amount available in the water source in danger for everyone else.

Since the government already wastes a lot of money, I'm not sure how I feel about this. Not to mention when they realize they need to increase the taxes to cover the cost of researching and drilling for additional sources. A company will make sure it's not wasting money because it needs to stay competitive.

I'm just playing devils advocate here, these are tough problems to solve. I certainly don't possess the industrial knowledge it takes to provide water for millions of people, but some people think the solution is easier than it is. That's all I'm doing in this thread, thought provoking.

> Just look at Flint

Flint happened because of leadership mistakes, and while the damage can't be undone, hopefully the legal mess that it spawned will improve the future.

Sadly, democracy is a contest of popularity, not of aptitude. This could happen again.

It's a basic human right. People need to have access to clean drinking water, and if they can't afford it they still need to get it. "Nothing is free" simply doesn't apply here.

There’s a cost to providing it, so it does apply. Human right or not. It’s a human right to eat, but I have a cost in labor and expenses to acquire food by various means to ensure that happens.

Again, not arguing whether it’s a human right or not.

The very first line of the article:

> The City of Detroit announced on Monday that it will restore water to residents in the city who have had their service cut off due to unpaid bills so those people have the ability to wash their hands.

The parent said you can cut off water from commercial properties for non-payment, not residential properties.

that's barbaric

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