The war in Ukraine has turned many things about our global society on its head. Regardless of where you live the chances of the war having a direct impact on your daily life is relatively high. One of the biggest changes in European society has been the impact that the war has had on energy prices, and households across the continent are being affected incredibly hard.
The energy prices are one of the main factors to the current rampant inflation that can be seen across the continent as of right now and many families are struggling to find a good way of dealing with this problem. Regardless of how your own personal finances are being affected by all of this, it can be a good idea to take a couple of minutes and dive into how this is impacting European households, and the way forward. This is one of the main talking points in European discourse as a whole currently, and businesses that are aiming to take advantage of people looking to cut their energy bill, such as the Swedish service Elbyte, are starting to become more and more commonplace.
The price of electricity hits northern countries more severely
The price of electricity is high across the entire continent, but not all countries are affected in the same way. Northern countries where the winter is harsh and uninviting naturally leads to those nations needing more energy on a daily basis compared to a country where one doesn’t need to use a lot of power to keep the house above freezing temperatures.
The electricity companies are posting record profits
At the same time, the electricity companies are not suffering from all of this. Due to them providing a service that one can’t possibly live without the energy companies are operating on the same margins procent wise, it’s just that those margins have become a lot higher.
This is not to say that it’s the fault of the electricity companies. European electricity is traded on an open market and power flows across borders into different countries on a regular basis. Due to this
Governmental aid
The price of electricity has reached such high levels that many Europeans are struggling to find effective ways of coping with this and the fallout on the housing market have started to rear their head in the last couple of months. This is going to be something that the government addresses in one way or another. One way is by providing aid to households with astronomically large bills, another would be to simply put a cap on what electricity is allowed to cost. Most governments are leaning towards the former though, as the market is far too complex to be able to handle a hard cap on costs.
Interesting Related Article: “How businesses can reduce their electricity costs“