Uh oh. If the multinationals can sell that line we're in real trouble.
If the disasters - war, famine, disease, death - inflicted on the world by the economics and politics of oil production and distribution is our model for good management of a commodity, we're completely fucked with water.
In dealing with a commons - which water, unlike oil, is - free market allocation does not work.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons noted that, game theory has put a solid foundation under the common observation, and it's not a lesson we need to learn over and over and over in a society with, like, books and internets and stuff.