"complicated"? socialism accurately describes public transit--an enterprise funded from general and dedicated tax revenues providing a service to the general public at user fees low enough to encourage wide usage but nowhere near able to fund the system. TVA--brought electricity to a "third world backwater" (former Confederacy) which the investor owned utilities were uninterested in serving. As to corruption, waste, fraud, etc, think of the vendors who plunder the DOD year in and year out--often buying enough Congress members to get purchases masndated which the Pentagon bosses don't even want (let alone need). And, unlike the bosses at UP, CSX, etc, you get a vote simply by being a citizen without having to buy thousands of $$ worth of shares. No, it isn't complicated.
SMUD works here]; so doLA Water & Power, local electricity distribution by cities like Alameda, Palo Alto, Eugene Oregon and many others. Maybe you prefer PG&E?