Water is a scarce resource in this case. You don't exactly let the "wealthy" buy off everything they can just because. Scarce resources need to be regulated my friend.
> Also betting that municipalities can't/won't just pull an eminent domain to regain access to the water.
They can’t just seize the water rights, they would have to purchase them at fair market value. Land with perpetual water rights happen to be worth *a lot* of money, which is why there haven’t been more government entities buying out current holders of water rights.
> know and have a framework for determining who owns the water, and who gets nothing when there isn't enough.
But there's never enough. It's oversold. Much like an airplane gets oversold. Only in this case 16% more water was assigned an owner than exists in an average year.
> don't like the answer of buy someone's rights.
That's not always something you can do because water rights are a state matter. Some water rights transfer with the real estate it is attached to. Some are locked into a specific owner and are non-transferable. Even if they can be transferred, because too many water rights were assigned, if you move to them to a different location the river might run dry before it gets to you.
>There are plenty of mega-wealthy people in California who would pay the premium to maintain their image of wealth, no matter how large.
Good. The money they're paying for water can now fund projects to get more water for everyone else (eg. desalination plants, water diversion, or buying water rights from current farmers).
Does anyone know if this has any tangential relationship to the fact that billionaires like t.boone pickens are buying up water rights across the country?
This seems obviously false to me for several reasons. Are you being serious? Perhaps I'm ignorant and you can enlighten me, but I think the water rights situation in the United States is pretty clear-cut.
>Then the market will allocate it to the most productive use.
The market will allocate it to the most profitable use, as markets do, which isn't the best use of the resource for people outside the capitalist class, who are the people who most need access to water.
Society isn't paying subsidies to water rights holders. Water rights are property rights. Legally they can't just be taken away. You can complain that it shouldn't be that way, but that is the legal reality.
The point is that 'rich guys' have the ability to make sure they survive 'the water wars' while you do not. And also it's in their interest to stay rich before then. And to stay rich, that means continuing to do what we're doing. Which results in the 'water wars'.
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