A small group of investor-owned electric companies in the United States, led by MidAmerican Energy and Florida Power & Light, report profit margins that significantly exceed the national average. According to the authors of the newly released report, these leading utilities retained between 18 and 27 percent of customer revenue as profit between 2021 and 2024.
“The top 10 utilities by average margin over 2021–2024 include MidAmerican Energy (27.22%), Florida Power & Light (23.51%), Nantucket Electric (23.24%), Empire District Electric (22.45%), Florida Public Utilities (20.35%), CalPeco (20.28%), Public Service Electric & Gas (19.44%), Duke Energy Carolinas (19.07%), Alabama Power (18.71%), and AEP Texas (18.63%).” The report also notes that “Among the 79 utilities reporting 2025 results as of this analysis, the highest margins were seen at FPL (27.44%), MidAmerican Energy (27.16%), SoCal Edison (26.11%), Georgia Power (22.57%), and AEP Texas (22.19%).”
These figures reveal that while the average electric utility in the study kept about 13 cents of every dollar from a customer’s bill as profit, these specific companies are keeping significantly more. This means that for a household or business paying for power, a much larger portion of their monthly bill is going directly to the company’s owners and investors as profit, rather than being used to pay for the actual generation of electricity or the maintenance of the power lines.
The Energy & Policy Institute released its report “Paying for Their Profits: How Ratepayers Foot the Bill for Soaring Utility Profits” in March 2026. Authored by Daniel Tait, Sue Sturgis, and Shelby Green, the analysis tracks financial data from over 100 investor-owned utilities to reveal the significant role corporate returns play in driving up household electricity costs.
