The False Promise of Deregulation

[rusty charly]

Homeowners are facing high heating bills after state regulators a month ago gave New Jersey Natural Gas Co., the utility serving most of Monmouth and Ocean counties, a rate hike that will increase average monthly bills nearly 24 percent this winter.

http://www.app.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060115/BUSINESS/601150343/1003

Electricity rates are expected to rise soon, too. Jersey Central Power & Light Co., which serves most of Monmouth and Ocean, has a 7 percent rate hike pending with state regulators. But the prospects of switching to another supplier on that side of the energy aisle is even bleaker than those for natural gas. There are no companies offering that service for residential customers.

It's not exactly the scenario envisioned when state officials were heralding a new deregulated energy market in 1999. It was supposed to be a world where alternative suppliers would be knocking on consumers' doors, offering them competitive prices.

But few people ever switched. "My big hope was choice and competition, and that has never happened," said Sea Bright lawyer Blossom Peretz, the state ratepayer advocate at the time.