Jason, please pardon my directness, but this post is weird.
Individual people cannot infallibly predict the future, as you point out. But (1) you seem to blame that on markets rather than on people, and (2) you seem to think the failure of people to predict the future correctly can be corrected by designating a few of them to control the others according to their own equally fallible predictions of the future.
If we could correctly predict that potable water will become scarce, then its current price would be higher--and, conversely, if we could correctly predict that it would become even more abundant, then its current price would be lower. The thing is, the current price (of everything traded in efficient markets) is based on the BEST currently available information about future conditions. The fact that water is priced on the basis of the BEST currently available information (in an efficient market) is what makes water correctly priced. As we get better information (in the future) the "correct" (market) price will adjust accordingly.
Oh my goodness, you actually think replacing the collective judgment of many fallible people (the market) with a tiny number of fallible people (a new variant on the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau) would improve on that?
One more thing: "discounting" means "attaching less value." We discount future costs and benefits because they are uncertain and will happen in an uncertain future, whereas what happens today is known. "Discounting" is not a synonym for "predicting" or "avoiding."