As someone who has transitioned from reading a paper copy of the Arizona Daily Sun to the wan substitute of flipping its pages on my laptop while drinking my morning coffee, I was interested a couple of weeks ago to note that two entire virtual pages were taken up by a text-heavy announcement from our friendly local electricity provider. Arizona Public Service, it appeared, is angling for a rate increase, which if approved would become the fourth in ten years.
At first I was alarmed, because the wording clearly specifies that APS is requesting for itself an “annual revenue increase” of $662.44 million, or almost 16%. This sounded to me, an APS user, like I would surely be responsible for furnishing some of that revenue increase to the company, which, in an admirable display of transparency, in the next paragraph let readers know that it was planning to experience a “return on equity,” aka profit, of 10.7 percent. Reflexively, my left hand darted around the tabletop, trying to reassure itself that it knew where my wallet was.
Fortunately, the very next sentence allayed its concerns. That’s because APS, whose commitment to thoroughness admirably extends a couple of digits to the right of the decimal point, reported that it was projecting a “net revenue increase experienced by customers” of $579.52 million, or almost 14%.
I will admit that I have long been skeptical of large corporations turning large profits by furnishing a product that is not a luxury but an essential service. And I will admit also that I am not an economist or an accountant, and not really a math person at all. From the arithmetic perspective I frankly find it a bit mystifying that APS will experience an “annual revenue increase” at the same time that customers, as the wording appears to state, will “experience” a “net revenue increase” of their own. Sounds like a win-win!
But I am excited no end by the possibilities. If we as APS customers can “experience” a “net revenue increase” at the same time that the corporation is increasing its profits, then surely other sorts of win-win arrangements are possible. It’s worth noting here that UNS Gas has also petitioned the Arizona Corporation Commission for an increase in its basic monthly rate from $10 to $15. Perversely, it simply calls this proposal an “increase” in “the monthly Basic Service Charge.” Which is why when I e-mail the Corporation Commission with my opinions I am going to suggest that they approve the APS proposal, but not the UNS one. If a corporation lacks the basic customer-management skill of using language reassuring us that we are going to profit right alongside it, can it really be trusted to keep the furnace going? I think not.
Maybe Amazon will do better. Some analysts predict that the annual Prime fee will go up from $139 to $159 next year, thereby fueling Jeff Bezos’ quest to keep up with his frenemy and rival Elon Musk. I am optimistic that these dueling space lords are both canny and ambitious enough to recognize that they can best keep their customers happy through soothing language use. Net revenue increase for the corporation? I am going to take that as meaning: a fresh Andrew Jackson for my pocket! I already have plans for how to spend it at Whole Foods, an act for which I will probably be rewarded with a dividend.
And the same win-win principle can obviously be extended beyond the merely financial. Surely there is no reason we cannot all “experience” a “net air quality increase” as the Trump administration kneecaps clean energy plans in favor of burning more coal. Or a “net coolness increase” as the rate of planetary warming reaches acceptable levels again after showing alarming signs of slowing during the Biden years. Because what could be cooler than appearing unruffled even as the ice caps melt and storm surge sweeps in through the Mar-a-Lago lobby?
Back when I was an undergraduate studying literature, I had to steel myself for all those regular raised-eyebrow questions from business or computer science majors all riffing on the same concept: and what are you going to do with that? In our new age of win-win language acrobatics, I feel I now have the perfect answer to their question: make millions, of course.
