That's a good question. Prices are a good start. Consumer prices seem to be twice in G as in the US. Don't know where you get the "wholesale price is 4x in G". Most of what I can find is that wholesale is usually pretty close.
My guess of what G could do to increase consumption and thus moneys:
- Lower prices (duh). End user power is taxed heavily to subsidize industry power
- Remove mandatory energy labels on all electronics. Who really needs to know how much a TV or fridge is going to consume in power?
- Mandate "power-included" in rents. If you pay a fixed sum, you might as well leave the fridge open to cool the kitchen
- Mandate central heating and cooling. If you only pay a share of what you consume, might as well go full blast on everything
- stop subsidizing energy efficiency for new single and multi-tenant homes.
- stop building solid houses. Plywood walls are fine
Nice comparison on power prices: https://www.iea.org/reports/electricity-market-report-decemb...
PER YEAR
> I wonder what it would take to get German energy consumption up to a better level.
Jokes aside, you're describing a correlation. America does not seem "more civilized" to me, you guys are just wasteful. Wasted energy does not lead to more civilization.
No; It's completely consistent with my model. America is more advanced by a huge margin. It's also evidently a more desirable place to live; the Germany-to-USA migration rate is something like 3x the other direction.