Why Don’t Water Wasters Pay Much More Per Gallon?

As Texas’s population booms and the state grows hotter and drier, it’s more important than ever to understand: Who’s wasting our water? To reduce waste, common sense suggests rescinding water’s current exception from the law of supply and demand. Typically in a market economy, if there’s not enough of a resource, its price goes up, encouraging conservation. Yet while water grows increasingly scarce, it remains relatively cheap.In Texas, unlike in most other states, we treat water both as a public good and as private property, depending on where it comes from and who’s pumping it. Landowners drawing water from their own wells pay almost nothing beyond the price of a permit and a pump. There’s little financial incentive to cut back on water use.The Legislature would…

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