this story takes place in maryland

but it's the same in connecticut. my 82 year old father got an oil (heating) bill for $728.00. how are people (working families and like my father, the elderly and retired) supposed to pay that? his electric bill went way up as well.

how can we all afford 300, 400, 500, 600, 700 utility bills? how much longer do you think this is going to go on? i mean how much longer before we all STOP paying our bills because we CANNOT.

(king george has to pay his bills for the crawford ranch, no? doesn't he see we're all f**ked?)

The Power Drain
THE PINCH AT HOME Many Residents Stung By High Cost of Utilities

By Kirstin Downey Washington Post Staff Writer

George Mann, an $18-an-hour grocery store clerk in Waldorf, found himself trembling last month as he wrote the check to pay his $644 electricity bill. Still financially recovering from a $549 electricity bill in January, Mann said he noticed he was "shaking" as he paid the bill, full of anxiety about how he would find the money to pay other household expenses for the three-bedroom rambler where he lives with his wife and four children.
"When they deregulated the market, there was supposed to be competition and prices were supposed to go down," he said. "But why did the bills go in the opposite direction?"
That is a question being echoed in households across the region, particularly as heating bills rise in the coldest months of the year. .............