[detourdog]

My reimbursement for solar production takes about 6% for transmissions fees. I'm not sure which cost you are worried about but I make infrastructure payments. I don't think the electricity I produce travels more the 200 feet to my neighbors houses.

[reitzensteinm]

Well, my question would be whether retail minus 6% would be the prevailing rate in a free market with healthy competition, or is it a subsidy?

I'm not against subsidies. Germany pushing solar well before it made financial sense, enabling the economies of scale we see today, was one of the greatest wins of public policy in the 21st century. I paid a lot of tax when I lived there and was happy to contribute in some small way to that effort.

But subsidies risk turning into middle class welfare, continuing long after they make sense from a public policy point of view because interest groups form that don't want to give them up.