Ronald Reagan once said: “If you want more of something, subsidize it; if you want less of something, tax it.” If this simple principle still holds true, state lawmakers are telling us we need: 1) more nuclear power plants that are costly and produce long-lasting radioactive waste and 2) more giant data centers that gobble up our energy and water resources. Why?

According to news reports, legislators want to pass a sales tax exemption (House File 2757) that could cost taxpayers $65 million for the restart of Iowa’s only nuclear power plant — the Duane Arnold Energy Center near Cedar Rapids that was shut down six years ago.

Duane Arnold’s majority owner is NextEra Energy Resources, a Florida-based company with a net worth of $196 billion. NextEra wants to restart Duane Arnold, in large part, to sell lots of electricity to hyperscale data centers owned by Google, and possibly other Big Tech giants.

So the tax break that helps NextEra get its nuke plant up and running also helps Google. For what it’s worth, Google’s parent company (Alphabet) has a net worth of $3.8 trillion.

Why should we subsidize nuke plants and giant data centers that are flush with cash? It doesn’t make a lick of sense to me.