Kind of leaving out the main point there. People don't use a lot of water. Industry and Farming do. We depend on both of those for...pretty much our entire society.

Water-intensive industrial processes can move to where the water is. Farming is more of a challenge but some crops need more water than others; there's a lot of scope for substitution.

Yeah maybe someday we can stop growing all our produce in the damn desert just because the weather was slightly more profitable.

Because all of that's going to be cheap right? In a nation which loses its mind even gas prices go up 20c?

People use water directly and indirectly. And water is "used" and "used" - it's not as simple as measuring a pipe, you need to know where it goes.

Something like 600 million people live below the poverty line, which with current inflation is at $2.15 per day; so for them a 38 cent per day rate means diverting almost 20% of their income just on water. For comparison, that's a much larger share than what USA residents spend on food (~13% of their income).

The figures assume a US citizen level of water consumption, someone on $2 a day would use much less than this.