Water is the government’s responsibility

“Governments, not private firms, must take responsibility for getting water to their people, a new report argues.”

Why is it today we need a new report to tell us the obvious. When I was a secondary student our Economics teacher taught us that basic utilities like water, electicity, gas and telephone are the responsibility of the government. And that was the way it was and should be.

When utilities like water move from service to business profit becomes the bottom-line. But what about the farm a little out of the way who is not getting water and will not get water because the water business decided it was not profitable or not in its interest? Would this farm not get the benefits if it had been a tax payer?

A service would not think twice in making subsistance possible for this farmer. A business will see profit first over viability. But what the government does not realize is that we need people like this farmer, for diversity is a key ingredient to survival.

Diversity within any system is essential whether in nature or human constructed ones like the economy. Somehow we have come to a point where we simply have forgotten that we are part of a larger system that follow the physical and biophysical laws of the universe and that even our system must follow this.

It is a like a “good” Hollywood movie: it is so real we think the movie is the reality. How many people have you known literally bend over backwards to avoid bullets? It can only happen on film. And even if it can happen in reality the effort involved is much. So we need a reality-check. In short, we, humankind, are so good at deception that we even deceive ourselves.

So when are we going to wake up to the fact that we have been deceived by the economic discourse?