The Coming Shock: Why America Must Confront the Rising Cost of Electricity Now
This was originally posted on Ron Bonjean’s Substack. Subscribe here to receive all of Ron’s thoughts directly to your inbox.
For years, kitchen-table debates about household expenses have centered on familiar culprits—groceries, health care, tuition. But a new topic is quietly surging to the forefront: the cost of energy. From our homes to our highways, electricity is becoming the central fuel of American life—and its rising cost will affect every household in ways many still don’t fully grasp.
The transformation of our energy economy is happening fast. More data centers—vast warehouses of servers powering everything from AI to video streaming—are being built in every corner of the country. These facilities consume massive amounts of electricity, often more than entire towns. Meanwhile, the push toward electrification is reshaping demand: Americans are purchasing electric vehicles at record rates, more people are converting to electric appliances, and new forms of automation and smart living are adding further strain to the grid.
Yet while the technology is accelerating, awareness among average American families is lagging. Most haven’t noticed that their utility bills are slowly creeping up. But they will. That’s because electricity prices, once stable and predictable, are already rising in many regions—and are projected to climb even faster. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, residential electricity prices this year were up 11% in August from January. Without a serious policy response, the cost of powering our lives—our cars, kitchens, workplaces, and schools—could become one of the defining economic challenges of the next decade.
President Trump who increasingly speaks about affordability and consumer impacts, has an opportunity to lead on this issue. He should be talking more directly about the energy transition and focus the practical matter of how much Americans will pay to keep the lights on. That requires policy ideas rooted in economic realism: strengthening the grid, incentivizing domestic energy production from all sources, and ensuring that the cost of modern digital infrastructure doesn’t come at the expense of everyday families. But this isn’t a problem that he can solve alone. Congress must step up as well. Lawmakers have a critical role to play in crafting bipartisan solutions to protect the American public from electricity price shocks.
The point is not to stop innovation or retreat from progress. It’s to recognize the hidden price tag tied to the technologies we now depend on. If our leaders don’t treat this rising cost seriously, Americans will pay for it—literally and make sure our nation’s leaders feel it politically. Energy may not yet be the first issue raised at town halls and rallies, but it will be soon. The candidate who articulates a plan for affordable, reliable electricity may not only win votes, but shape how America powers the future.
