One culture thing I learned moving from an impoverished rural community to San Francisco was how little time the affluent spend on the necessities: cooking, cleaning, laundry, home improvement, shopping, etc.

Most of my free time was spent on the necessities.

Moving to SF and embracing that lifestyle (being able to afford that lifestyle...) freed me up for the pursuit of happiness.

I look at government the same way: public service should assume some of the burdens for the citizenry. utilities should be one of those things assumed by the state, paid for by taxes. The administration of which has a goal of driving down costs for customers, NOT for increasing profit