" I live inThe dark" BBC article.FFS.

[Nolongera]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cwz0vxl21m3jo

This bloke is wandering around in the dark to save money. No where in the article does it mention how much it actually cost to run a light.

A standard 6w modern bulb costs less than 2p for ten hours. I simply don't believe this is is anyway cost effective.

My mother in law had a fall trying to save money by not switching lights on, when I asked her how much she thought it cost, she reckoned about 50p

Articles like this are part of the problem.

But they don’t only need to make X profit. They need to maximise profits for their shareholders. You charge what the market is willing to bear, not ‘enough to make X profit’. No company says “oh people are buying more of our stuff so let’s reduce the price so we don’t make too much money”, especially when there is scarcity.

Energy companies are making record profits due to the Iraq war - they aren’t going to drop their prices to limit their profits to some arbitrary number.

For the UK... I will look into this but somehow, I don't think you're right about energy in the UK. They can't charge more than we can afford for commodities so it's definitely limited by the job market and earning power at least.

In the UK it’s limited by the price cap. But yes, obviously prices are limited by willingness and ability to purchase. The optimal price (at which profits are maximised) is determined by the intersection of the demand curve and profit curve.

This is pretty basic economics, not anything crazy. This might be a good place to
start if you want to learn about it: books.core-econ.org/the-economy/microeconomics/07-firm-and-customers-06-maximize-profit.html