Comment by layoric
1 day ago
The US is getting fleeced! 8 years ago it cost me about $10k AUD to install 6kW. Yes, it came with a $2.8k subsidy but still we are talking about a third.. 8 years ago.. And I paid extra for a Fronius inverter.
1 day ago
The US is getting fleeced! 8 years ago it cost me about $10k AUD to install 6kW. Yes, it came with a $2.8k subsidy but still we are talking about a third.. 8 years ago.. And I paid extra for a Fronius inverter.
The first rule of getting solar panels is never look at prices after you buy your system. :P
At least you bought them 8 years ago and not 20, you could have had a 1.5kW system for the same price.
US blue-collar labor is very expensive.
Homeowners are getting the short end, but the solar installers are doing well.
Australia pays their tradies higher wages than solar installers in the US, and still has far cheaper costs.
Here's a long podcast episode talking about why it's so much more expensive in the US versus Australia, with a solar expert from Australia that had just added a bunch of C&I solar here in the US:
https://www.volts.wtf/p/whats-the-real-story-with-australian
Local permitting, utility fuckery, tariffs, etc. all add up.
As an Aussie you should know the American way, pay executives or management absurd amounts and the people who actually get their hands dirty get paid as little as possible.
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It is well known in Australia that you can make a lot of money working as a tradie. Better than software developers do here that's for sure. You are lucky if you can get a tradie to step foot inside your house for less than $200 USD, then the hourly costs start running away pretty quick.
$200 is about the going rate to get somebody to show up in the US as well (DC-metro, specifically). Maybe not for a generic handyman (though that's increasingly true as well), but somebody with a license and training (electrician, plumber).
You’re potentially getting the wrong type of tradie. What, are you calling Fallon’s or something?
partly because there is a shortage in Australia of people with such skills.