Maybe pork prices are climbing? Xinhua has posted a cheery article warning that “residents in Shanghai will pay much more for water starting from August” due to new water treatment and conservation efforts. The city’s water will become pricier, but perhaps it won’t taste like dirty metal.
The new pricing scheme will be based on water use per cubic meter, as Xinhua reports:
Shanghai has set three price brackets for residential users. A household that consumes 220 cubic meters of water or less a year will pay 3.45 yuan (0.56 U.S. dollars) per cubic meter, up 23.2 percent from the previous price.
Households whose annual water consumption falls between 220 and 300 cubic meters will pay 4.83 yuan per cubic meter, while those consuming more than 300 cubic meters a year will pay 5.83 yuan per cubic meter.
The Shanghai government held a public hearing in June to discuss the water price increase with local residents, and then promptly ignored them.
[Image via Slinky2000]
