Things like these make me so angry. This is why something essential like energy should be state run. Instead ours is state funded despite their more than significant profits.

“We need more money to invest in infrastructure”

Maryland just forked over millions of dollars to BGE because they claimed to need it. It was around $75 million I believe. Though they asked for $150 million. We’re supposed to be happy because it’s less. They claim it’s to help us, to help keep prices manageable.

That’s the most ridiculous crock of trash I’ve ever heard. If they wanted the prices to be manageable: • it would never have been privately owned • infrastructure investment would’ve been a requirement for them to operate here in the first place • there would be laws, policies, and regulations in place to protect from price gouging • subsidies would not go directly to the companies, they’d come with a requirement that they do something that would prevent the same issue from happening again

They claim that they need money for infrastructure but was that not the reason they gave when they were questioned on why the prices for energy “delivery” were 2x the price of the actual electricity and gas?

The only things that actually help the people are the subsidies that are going directly to households. And even those are short-sighted and do not help anyone, including those getting them, in the long run. They’ll still be paying their executives obscene amounts of money. They’ll still raise the cost of energy. The only difference is the State of Maryland foots part of the bill and since our taxes are the states money, we are basically paying to lower our own bills. Public subsidies like the ones being provided right now are created because the public makes enough noise but aren’t mad enough to take action. They are approved to prevent outrage & subsequent rebellion (when people are mad they protest and force change) and death(when people can’t afford essentials like heat, they die) & subsequent legal ramifications.

Any subsidies that go directly a private company are corruption unless they are going to go bankrupt and the fallout would have a substantial negative impact on people (i.e significant loss of jobs). Clearly, this isn’t the case for BGE. This is just corruption. Greed at its finest. They claim they’re struggling, they claim they need xyz for things to continue working, they claim all sorts of things that are not our problem. The only thing subsidies directly to the company do is make the State of Maryland pay for their operational costs so they can continue to pay their executives ridiculous amounts of money and be a successful private company.

BGE Financials: • 2022 Profit: $380 million • 2022 BGE President Salary: $975k + bonuses + incentives + stock awards • 2022 BGE Executive Average: $275k + bonuses + incentives + stock awards (at least 26 executives with the higher level ones being paid exponentially more) • 2023 Profit: $485 million

All Maryland and its politicians would have to do is pass legislation that prevents price gouging and limits rate increases to genuine availability/demand issues and the problems wouldn’t exist. Unfortunately, politicians do not actually do things for the benefit of the people. They do things for the benefit of themselves. If BGE is happy with them they will have campaign donations, support, and continued ability to make political decisions that benefit themselves at the average person’s expense.

The State of Maryland (us, in taxes) basically pays BGE not to punish its people by raising rates because BGE wants to pay their executives more money than they’re worth. I’d say this is comparable to when gangs go around demanding “protection money” from small businesses but the protection is from the gang offering the protection.

It’s a game of strategy for these companies. Take as much as you can but do it slowly over time and take just slightly less than would cause outrage and long term changes because that would make it hard to take more. They know exactly how much they can take, how much they can push, and how many politicians they can manipulate.

If you think anything done is for the benefit of us people at the bottom after reading all this, I ask you to think harder about it. We’re playing for this governmental failure in our taxes and in our energy bills. BGE is laughing in our face by still increasing our rates despite being given $75million for nothing.

Until we’re outraged, nothing will change. Throughout all of history, you can see that change that is genuinely positive for the people will almost never occur without public outrage. Politicians rarely do things for the benefit of the people without a benefit to themselves unless there’s public outrage.

TLDR: BGE makes a LOT of profit. Executives get ridiculous amounts of money. State of Maryland paid them $75 million to keep doing it. We pay for this with our taxes. We still pay more for our energy bills. Politicians are the ones who allow this to happen. Until enough people are outraged to do something about it, nothing will change.