New York Becomes America's Third State To Ban Plastic Bags (yahoo.com) 215
An anonymous reader quotes the Associated Press:
Gov. Andrew Cuomo and fellow Democrats who control the Legislature have reached a deal to make New York the third state with a ban on single-use plastic grocery bags as they worked to finalize budget agreements, officials said Friday. The ban would prohibit grocery stores from providing plastic bags for most purchases, something California has been doing since a statewide ban was approved in 2016. Hawaii has an effective statewide ban, with all its counties imposing their own restrictions....
New York's ban wouldn't take effect until next March. The plan also calls for allowing local governments the option to impose a 5-cent fee on paper bags, with 3 cents going to the state's Environmental Protection Fund and 2 cents kept by local governments.
Meanwhile, Tennessee's state House and Senate have passed a different kind of bill -- one that bans local Tennessee governments from regulating plastic bags, according to local channel WMC.
One Memphis councilman had proposed allowing the use of plastic bags, but with a seven-cent tax to support clean water initiatives. "But that won't happen if the governor signs the bill to 'ban the bans.'"
New York's ban wouldn't take effect until next March. The plan also calls for allowing local governments the option to impose a 5-cent fee on paper bags, with 3 cents going to the state's Environmental Protection Fund and 2 cents kept by local governments.
Meanwhile, Tennessee's state House and Senate have passed a different kind of bill -- one that bans local Tennessee governments from regulating plastic bags, according to local channel WMC.
One Memphis councilman had proposed allowing the use of plastic bags, but with a seven-cent tax to support clean water initiatives. "But that won't happen if the governor signs the bill to 'ban the bans.'"
Let's make this cost more. (Score:2, Insightful)
allowing local governments the option to impose a 5-cent fee on paper bags
And there it is, politicians funding their little pork barrel projects.
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That was my first thought as well. What a racket! Charge a fee for paper bags, then make using anything else illegal!
Though, to be fair, it's not just local governments. The State government gets 60% of the take from the paper bags, the locals the remaining 40%....
Glad I don't live there, since walking my dog uses up a lot of (soon to be illegal) plastic bags
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You might be forced to use proper biodegradable dog poop bags, which might run a couple of bucks a month, pretty horrible.
Re:Let's make this cost more. (Score:5, Insightful)
Or, you know, maybe it's just incentivizing behavior with some harmless service fees that also help serve to cover the negative externalities of paper and/or plastic bags.
Nah. It's just more naked corruption from all those greedy politicians. Good thing there's smart guys like you who REALLY see the truth through the lies.
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That's what tells you if this is a surcharge to modify people's behavior, or an attempt by greedy politicians to grab more of your money. Deposit = behavior modification. Fee = greed.
Re:Let's make this cost more. (Score:5, Interesting)
That's what the local Republicans said here, too, before we passed this at a city level. LOL
We made it illegal to use disposable plastic bags, and legal to give out paper bags, but you're required to charge 5 cents.
See, the money doesn't go to the city. The store keeps the 5 cents. The purpose of the 5 cents to prevent the store from giving it to you unless you wanted it. If the owner of the store hates hippies and doesn't care about the environment, they're still not allowed to give out disposable bags.
The customer won't tolerate being charged for things they didn't want, but if they forgot their reusable bags at home and don't want to buy more, they can still get the paper bag for 5 cents; in which case, they don't care about the 5 cents! It works well at both ends.
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Wait...you mean stores where you live expect you to own and bring your own bags to the store each time you shop with them?
I've never heard of such a thing.
WTF do you live?
Wow..that's just weird.
I mean, here they usually ask you paper or plastic, but I"ve never seen a store that assumed YOU would provide your own bags to bring your grocery or other purchases home with....
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Yep, that's the California Hair-shirt environmentalist dogma nowadays. Go to the store, forget to bring your bags, get to the checkout... oh sorry no bags, you'll have to either carry in your arms or buy the reusable bags we have at a 1000% convenience markup.
Or just drop the stuff right there and walk out, which is what I'd do. But they probably made that illegal too.
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If you can't afford reusable bags, or paper bags for 5 cents, I'm gonna call bullshit on the claim that you were "shopping."
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They all promised to do this when the law was being voted on, but then after they lost the vote they found out you just keep some bags in the car and there is no way these sorts of lazy people are going to drive to the next city over.
These are mostly people who would drive to the mailbox if the mail carrier didn't bring it to the door.
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I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or if you've really never travelled more than 500 km from your place of residence.
There are whole huge states where the stores have handy disposable bags at the ready. Some of these states are even contiguous.
It would indeed feel quite weird to suddenly encounter stores demanding that you bring your own bags.
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There are whole huge states where the stores have handy disposable bags at the ready. Some of these states are even contiguous.
It would indeed feel quite weird to suddenly encounter stores demanding that you bring your own bags.
Nobody "demands" you bring your own bags, but if you want bags at the cashier, you have to purchase them, they are not free. Hence, people buy sturdy reusable bags and sacs and bring them with them when they shop, in order to avoid having to purchase new (often flimsy and easily breakable) bags each time. It's quite normal.
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There is no "demand" to bring your own bags in the requirement to charge 5 cents per bag. It is merely that it forces customers to think about the bags, and when they think about the bags and make a choice, the obvious high quality choice for the consumer to own a bunch of reusable bags.
Reusable bags improve the shopping experience. They're higher quality bags. You can trust the handles. You can trust the bottom. They cost between 50 cents and $2.50, with the standard plastic ones typically selling for 99 c
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I"ve lived in several states here in the US, and have never encountered this type of thing, no.
I"m guessing since you used "km" as a measure of distance, you are not in/from the US, so, it isn't really a matter for you to argue in the first place now is it?
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Not usually pork barrel (Score:2)
Lotteries, Sales Tax, flat Vehicle Taxes (and flat taxes in general, like alcohol tax) are all good examples of reg
But are they all "single use"? (Score:5, Insightful)
I use plastic bags I get from the stores for kitchen waste, for scooping the cat litter, occasionally to carry packed lunches, and various other things.
So if stores stop giving them out, then I need to buy them instead. The folks who sell (admittedly better quality but also more expensive) bags are probably laughing all the way to the bank.
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Someone was selling those stores plastic bags before. The total amount of plastic going into bags goes way down. Do you think that there are two unrelated plastic bag industries?
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The total amount of plastic going into bags goes way down.
Goes way up you mean. All the Glad trash bag commercials brag about how thick and strong they are. And how you can carry bowling balls and other crap around in them. If all I need is something to contain dog poop, I'd rather not reach for the super heavy duty bags.
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So if stores stop giving them out, then I need to buy them instead.
Good. Then maybe you'll make an informed purchase and buy some bio-degradable bags or proper trash bags that don't break down into fine particles as soon as they see a sunny day unlike the shitty thin shopping bags that are given out at stores which are pretty much the worst for the environment.
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So if stores stop giving them out, then I need to buy them instead.
Good. Then maybe you'll make an informed purchase and buy some bio-degradable bags or proper trash bags that don't break down into fine particles as soon as they see a sunny day unlike the shitty thin shopping bags that are given out at stores which are pretty much the worst for the environment.
I'll buy whatever is cheapest to do the job. Ebay direct from Shenzhen works for me.
Maybe we will soon need bag police at the borders.........
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I'll buy whatever is cheapest to do the job. Ebay direct from Shenzhen works for me.
Maybe we will soon need bag police at the borders.........
An excellent explanation why polluting products need to be taxed to become more expensive and therefore convey their full environmental cost, passing that cost (and information about it) on to consumers (who can then choose to buy something cheaper). The price mechanism at work.
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Excessive taxation drives underground markets. So good luck with that.
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Excessive taxation drives underground markets. So good luck with that.
That is a retarded argument. You clearly haven't seen the cost difference between a biodegradable bag and a standard plastic bag. There is no underground market opportunity to derive profit on something worth next to nothing.
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Excessive taxation drives underground markets. So good luck with that.
For flimsy plastic bags? Lolz. It's not booze, or cigarettes. Also, charging 5-10 cents per bag is not "excessive", and even if it were, there are inexcessively priced substitutes.
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You would obviously be surprised the things one can buy "under the table".
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You would obviously be surprised the things one can buy "under the table".
Look, I come from (and lived in) a country where at one point "under the table" was the only way to buy pretty much anything at all. I am well-versed in how black markets work.
However, in advanced and rich Western societies (like the one I'm typing this from now), such things are marginal. Where I am right now booze and cigarettes are heavily taxed (booze is a government monopoly, 80 cents out of each dollar spent by the consumer on legal alcohol purchases goes to the government one way or another). Does a
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Well, speaking from Canada, I have bought black market booze in the past, but not recently. Still, I could get black market booze, cigarettes,and all sorts of drugs within 24 hours easily. Things like guns might take a few days and would entail more risk. Before we legalized MJ last fall it was trivial to find.
I'm not saying there will be neighborhood bag pushers - it will be more like I said, online from Shenzhen. I just put some non-DOT approved light bulbs in my car recently (the horror!) The mail s
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I'll buy whatever is cheapest to do the job. Ebay direct from Shenzhen works for me.
Indeed but that's because you're don't externalise your costs. There will always be some arsehole putting convenience and direct cost above everything else (equal case with littering in the street), but there are enough people who actually care about this and by providing them a choice the problem is reduced. There are also enough people who now being put in a position to make the choice will make the right one.
Maybe we will soon need bag police at the borders.........
We have those. They are called regulations. Enjoy your bags while you can. God knows those extra
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I don't understand why t hey don't just replace plastic bags with biiodegradable ones?
Counties that have banned plastic bags (Score:4, Interesting)
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Add Italy to the list.
Bigger Picture (Score:2)
Stupid (Score:2)
I'm all for banning plastic bags where it makes sense.
But to do this at the same time?
The plan also calls for allowing local governments the option to impose a 5-cent fee on paper bags
This is just stupid. Why would you do this? Ban one item and tax the other? STUPID!
Should be more like 25 cent tax on using a plastic bag and no tax on the paper bag. That would achieve behavior change. But this plan? I'm not sure what it's trying to do, ban one item and discourage use of the alternative?
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Fake news (Score:2)
"The ban would prohibit grocery stores from providing plastic bags for most purchases, something California has been doing since a statewide ban was approved in 2016."
^ As a California resident, I know that's a lie. Plastic bags are available in just about every grocery store for 10 cents. Even at self-checkout usually.
That said, the bags you pay 10 cents for can be re-used hundreds of times -- I've been using the same 10 cent bags for years. So perhaps in that sense single-use bags that disintegrate after
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I don't mind the ban on plastic bags so much. A lot of grocery stores around me have started giving plastic more often then paper, and the plastic bags are shit and rip too easily. I prefer paper and always ask for them whenever there's an option.
Now, charging for paper bags? Even if its just 5c, that's kinda bullshit.
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How often to wash shopping bags? (Score:3, Informative)
now I carry a reusable bag, which is a lot more robust than a plastic carrier and still going strong after hundreds of uses.
And how many washes? Reusable bags tend to pick up coliform bacteria rawther quickly [llu.edu].
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Off topic: I didn't get a message that you're replied to my post and can no longer find the Slashdot message settings. Have these gone away? Are the new owners intentionally trying to prevent meaningful conversation on this site? That would explain why the standard of comments has dropped a lot recently...
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No it's not kinda shit, it's really just a naked tax grab.
Exactly. But we can stand up for our rights and FIGHT BACK by reusing a fabric sack.
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I'm not jealous, I'm happy. This just means fewer potheads I have to deal with.
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People that smoke pot are the most useless faggots in society.
Not so fast. Some of them smoke it for medicinal reasons. And the last thing they want is a high. They're trying to relieve pain or nausea, or increase their appetite, etc.
And I'm not judging those who smoke it for recreational purposes, as long as they do so responsibly. Just like alcohol and tobacco. Don't DUI and don't make the rest of us breathe it.
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The two states that cause the most problems for the US. Fuck 'em.
How so?
Re:Fuck California and Fuck New York (Score:5, Informative)
The two states that cause the most problems for the US. Fuck 'em.
How so?
By paying more than their fair share of federal taxes, thus funding oppression of red-state farmers who just want the government to keep their damn hands off their crop subsidy checks.
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Also, the rest of the world tends to follow developed country regarding packaging and environmental rules.
Only because specifications sent to the factories mandate those changes for the export product - and thus the tooling exists for use for domestic product. The best this will do is cut the output of a few plastic bag factories in China. Not much else.
Mod parent up. 2 kinds of dishonesty in the story. (Score:2, Interesting)
Banning plastic bags is supported by paper bag manufacturers. Stores in and near Portland, Oregon stopped supplying plastic bags. The underlying reason appeared to be that International Paper [ipaper.com] (world map) has a plant near Portland. Grocery stores ther
2 more facts I forgot to mention in parent comment (Score:2)
2) Putting everything in a shopping cart, going to a car, and transferring everything to cloth bags owned by the shopper works well.
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Here in Australia they banned single-use plastic bags (at least most states have now done it) and the supermarkets adapted. They sell a range of reusable bags that are made out of strong material and last for many many uses as well as providing a thicker plastic bag that is thicker than the old bags and reusable multiple times.
So there should be no reason why a ban on single use plastic bags has to be a problem or why supermarkets would have any reason to use paper bags as a substitute for single use plasti
Re:Mod parent up. 2 kinds of dishonesty in the sto (Score:4, Insightful)
We re-use plastic bags to line wastebaskets, and to throw away wet materials. We always throw paper bags away.
You don't use paper bags to carry and throw away your recycling? I love doing that.
I can fill a paper bag with cardboard and paper waste, and just chuck the whole thing into the paper recycling container. I can also use it to carry plastic, metal and glass, and after sorting those out into their proper containers, throw the empty paper bags into the paper recycling container. Hands clean, everything recycled.
When I use plastic bags for that, I either have to walk over to the nearest garbage container and throw them away, or carry them back home.
Re:Let the Red shitholes do what they want (Score:5, Interesting)
We did it on a city level, years ago, and it has been great!
The local R's predicted an apocalypse, and also that people would drive to the suburbs to shop so they could get plastic bags. Neither happened. Most people learned to bring shopping bags to the grocery store, and stores learned that the world doesn't end if somebody buys a single item and carries it out the door without a plastic bag.
The streets are cleaner, there is no question about that. In the past, even people who didn't want a plastic bag had a hard time leaving without one. Problem solved. Easy.
Re: Let the Red shitholes do what they want (Score:4, Insightful)
No his brain works just fine. Humans are naturally arseholes. It's easier to take away that ability than to try and de-arsholeify the human race. Case in point: He made an observation, you replied with an insult. We can fix this by taking away your internet connection thus reducing the amount of shit posted on Slashdot.
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Only if by "homeless" you really mean, "feral drug addicts." AKA Zombies.
Regular homeless people don't have hep-C, and don't play in each other's poop anyways.
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the florescent lightbulb alternatives at the time were low quality crap, not nonsense at all.
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The USA started phasing out incandescent lightbulbs about 10 years after I replaced all of the ones in my house with brighter (and significantly lower power) CFLs, which saved me about as much money in electricity during their first two months of operation as they cost to buy. If the ones you could buy were worse, then that says a lot more about your local supply chain and access to modern technology than it does about the regulation.
As those bulbs die, I'm replacing them with LEDs, which are a bit brig
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no, you just had low standards. I used some of those bulbs (and still have a couple saved), the output was awful.
LED is the way, yes.
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You meen heat bulbs?
They are 100% efficient and legal in the USA! Fuck the EU and their hatred of heat.
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The EU loves heat we centrally heat everything. We also discovered that the science behind how to efficiently heat houses has progressed since the time of Edison.
Government vs market (Score:5, Interesting)
The red states don't oppose things the left favors per se. They typically favor a market-centric approach. So using your example of incandescent light bulbs, the red states would've preferred CFLs and LEDs compete with incandescents based solely on price. Once their savings in electricity and longevity versus incandescents made them a better buy, then people would've started buying them naturally and incadescents wold phase themselves out. It's pure democracy in action - every individual buyer gets to vote on what type of light bulb they prefer every time they buy one, unlike the statist top-down approach favored by the left. In that respect, the red states will "eventually fall in line". It was never a question of which technology was better long-term. It's a question of which technology is better now and how the transition should proceed.
Likewise, the right has no problem with solar or wind or EVs per se. If they're the better, more cost-effective product, the right will gladly embrace them. They just don't want those things shoved down their throats by government decree - they think every individual should be allowed to decide for themself whether or not to adopt these products.. But the left can't seem to grok this, so they concoct this fantasy where the right oppose anything the left advocates out of spite or ignorance.
Neither method is always right. The market approach can fail in the case of monopolies and certain niche cases summed up by the tragedy of the commons [wikipedia.org] (pollution is the most common example) and the prisoner's dilemma [wikipedia.org]. The government approach fails when the people deciding fail to anticipate unforeseen consequences to their actions (cable and phone monopolies are granted by the government in exchange for things like guarantees to cover low-income areas - arguably the harm of those monopolies far outweighs the good of covering the low income area), or don't adequately search the solution space before mandating a single solution (GSM nearly doomed us because it used TDMA which is horribly inefficient with bandwidth because it assigns a full bandwidth timeslice to users who only need a little or no bandwidth; fortunately the US allowed CDMA to compete and prove itself a superior solution; and eventually GSM adopted CDMA into its spec [wikipedia.org] and modern standards like LTE are based on the orthogonal signaling proven by CDMA).
That's what makes the U.S. approach to government so effective. Tens of thousands of local governments get to try both the regulatory and free market approach. Those who picked one can compare notes with those who picked the other to see who seems to be doing better. If the regulatory approach seems to be working better than the market approach, then numerous states will try adopting it, while others will retain the market approach. And when a clear majority of the states see a benefit to the regulatory approach, then that creates enough political support to pass the regulation on a national level. When you immediately regulate at the national level without sufficient trials at the lower government levels, you short circuit this weeding-out process and could doom us with something like GSM, except we'll never know because you prohibited the alternative before it could ever be tested.
Re:Government vs market (Score:5, Interesting)
I think you have a lot of very, very insightful points, but you've missed a few things, and I don't really agree with your initial premise.
The market approach can fail in the case of monopolies and certain niche cases summed up by the tragedy of the commons (pollution is the most common example) and the prisoner's dilemma.
There are a few other ways it can fail.
The average person is not very good at estimating the TCO of any product. In addition, they're not good at weighing cost vs features. Advertising, especially misleading advertising, can very effectively convince people to not follow market forces, and to not buy the more cost-effective product. This is not uncommon, and it's a major driver of legislation.
In an ideal world, advertising wouldn't do more than educate. Unfortunately, we've gotten really, really good at it, and we can get people to do all sorts of self-defeating shit with advertising. Due to this, we can't just rely on market forces to shake out the way we'd hope. A lack of enforcement for truth-in-advertising compounds this.
A second way market forces can fall is when corporations exert undue influence on government. While monopolies do this well, even without a monopoly a block of companies can really push a legislative agenda to benefit them, at the expense of the general population. With the travesty which was Citizens United, it's now easier than ever for a couple of companies to throw a lot of money into a PAC and influence government.
If we could separate government from corporate influence, it would be a different story. At that point, theoretically companies would have to compete on the merits of their products, and governments would be the will and voice of their people. Neither is happening at the moment, and that's a problem.
That's what makes the U.S. approach to government so effective. Tens of thousands of local governments get to try both the regulatory and free market approach.
But this is where the neocon platform shifts from "The red states don't oppose things the left favors per se. They typically favor a market-centric approach." to straight up hypocrisy. As the summary noted,
Meanwhile, Tennessee's state House and Senate have passed a different kind of bill -- one that bans local Tennessee governments from regulating plastic bags,
That (and similar bills) has happened in a number of other states, often very red states.
You say,
That's a common misconception by the left - that the red states oppose anything the left favors out of spite or ignorance.
But then we see shit like this, where the "small government, free market" republicans are willing to pass legislation that curtails local control, and enforces a market position which may not be the most cost effective one, all factors considered. (And that includes pollution, environmental damage, and climate change.) When a solid percent of republicans are climate change deniers, cynical hypocritical legislation like this can only seem to be done out of spite.
How else do you explain banning local governments from passing regulations to protect the environment, or even talking about climate change?
If it was the more big-government-friendly democrats doing this, and it was for social works, it's what we'd be expecting. When republicans are not allowing local governments to govern, and their legislation is focused on what are generally considered liberal issues, enacted by liberal pockets in their state, I don't see how you argue that it's not pure spite.
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You're attempting to write a post from the 1986 Republican party.
It is no longer 1986. This:
The red states don't oppose things the left favors per se
is absolutely not true. "Owning the libtards" is now the primary motivating factor for the Republican base. The libertarian-ish Republicans became a minority around 2010..
So using your example of incandescent light bulbs, the red states would've preferred CFLs and LEDs compete with incandescents based solely on price.
The only reason they can compete on price is the R&D spent by manufacturers. That R&D was only spent on CFLs and LEDs because of the government mandate. Bulb manufacturers were spending almost nothing on it, and then suddenly started sp
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Nope we just hate you.
I think your God that you guys claim to believe in and the Bible you preach from commands you to love people, not hate them.
Actually, this is how the US is supposed to work.. (Score:4, Insightful)
You are a citizen of your state first, and then of the United States second.
This is how the US was designed, if you don't like what they're doing in a state, you are free to move to a different one, that has laws, taxation and regulations that you agree with....
One size does not fit all, and this is what is great about the US.
Re: Let the Red shitholes do what they want (Score:2)
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Re:People, for and against (Score:5, Insightful)
Not if you're in your 50s or 60s (Score:2)
I know, I know, what about your children. Thing is, it's taboo to say you don't care about kids, especially your own, but I guarantee you that the "I got mine, FU" crowd exists and doesn't care.
This is the problem we're having: We are not negotiating with people in good faith. You can't reason with the people raping the earth and leaving a disaster for the next generation because t
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Or to put it more succinctly, "Don't anthropomorphize planets. They hate that."
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We only have one habitable planet, thus far
It's a big wet rock. It doesn't care what bags you use.
-- pays to treat it kindly.
It doesn't care about your feelings or about the stories you tell yourself about your so-called kindness.
You won't be receiving any sort of payment. Sorry. I know how people love to fantasize.
You know how they say - "it's not the end of the world, it's just the end of you". The planet doesn't care but we should.
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Plastic bags are meaningless either way.
Just like all your posts on this topic. Empty sophistry.
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You should make it easier to use plastic bags responsibly, not force people to do the "right" thing at the point of a gun.
Government is seriously a dumb man's way to organize society.
You know how you build a nice society? You get people to agree with your idea of a nice society; you don't bully them with the threat of force. Government must follow society, not lead it.
Government has been empirically shown to be the best way to organize a large society. It's probably and usually not necessary in a relatively isolated society of a few hundred people, where everybody knows everybody. Maybe also for a few thousand, where even when you don't know a person, you know someone else who does. Beyond that, you need some form of government.
A government-less or state-less large society is not some libertarian paradise, it is an oppressive nightmare. Without a government or a state au
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NY: Trying to save the planet (albeit maybe a little too agressively?)
TN: F*** THE PLANET! And how dare you even consider trying to do anything to protect it.
How about freedom to do what you want (the American way), but we tax single use plastic bags at a nickel a piece. Aldi charges 10 cents for an big heavy paper bag and like a quarter for those heavy reusable plastic bags and most consumers make the decision to re-use their own bags or stock boxes from the shelves. I wish every other grocery store wou
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NY: Trying to save the planet
"Save the planet" sounds like you believe you are a superhero in a children’s story.
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Wait, you're an adult, and you're still trying to shame people for being good? WTF?
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You are conflating unrelated things. A taboo is just a cultural belief and otherwise has no real basis in reality.
Environmental impact of plastic bags is very much real. Dead whales washing up with kilos of bags in their belly is not just a "taboo".
Making legislation on that is no different than making one against littering.
> pork or booze or toil on the sabbath
Now those are normally your business. Environment is everyone's business.
If we discover tomorrow that pigs suddenly have become carriers to some
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I don't think whales are sacred. But I do think they serve as a barometer of the problem.
I also am not suggesting that we should make policy based on singular instances, but on scientific projections.
Nor am I addressing New York specifically, but societies as a whole. That means Asia and Africa must also be pressed to address these problems. Advanced societies must lead by example.
What you and I differ is that I don't think people will do the right thing individually if they cannot perceive consequences of
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My actual experience with a free disposable plastic bag ban (what these measures really are) in California has been entirely positive, I have truly not heard anyone complain about its effects. You can still get plastic bags, if you want them, most places but they charge a dime for them and they are of really nice size quality, and even though these are "disposable" they are truly reusable and I (and most people) do reuse them. But cheap attractive reasonably strong and durable square polyester carrying bag
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New York: laws against people — making life worse for the people there
I don't understand. It was New York that just did something positive for people by further improving the world they live in. Did you get those backwards? Or were you trying to make a point and ended up just sounding stupid?
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New Yorker here.
I'm a fan of the $0.05 surcharge on plastic bags. Prior to that, people would put 2-3 items in a bag, and sometimes double bag them. Now, it's far more common for bags to be filled to capacity, so an order that would have used eight bags two years ago has reduced it to three or four bags. It's also far more common to see people bringing reusable bags to the store, or even the plastic bags from their last order. The amount of these bags rolling down the road has reduced drastically; it's been
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I don't see how removing the choice of plastic bags is going to solve anything
It's almost like you can make stuff out of something other than HDPE.
If I forget my shopping bag when I go shopping I get given paper bags.
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No I still don't understand. Are you now trying to say that all those places where plastic bag ban was put in place where plastic waste was reduced and sale of bio degradable alternatives has increased being all around better for the environment is accomplishing nothing?
Really help me here, my math isn't very good.
Re:Government solves government-created problems. (Score:5, Insightful)
Good Lord, man, talk about a slippery slope argument. Are you seriously blaming the problem of plastic pollution on lonely garbage men who let plastic bags blow away because they don't have a partner on the truck? And then, due to the banning of disposable plastic shopping bags, forecasting the doom of civilization?
I've been using re-usable cloth shopping bags for the last 5-10 years. I keep them in the trunk of the car. They're durable. I wash them periodically. They work just fine for getting groceries, other kinds of shopping, and even non-commerce related toting. I think I paid about $2.00 for each of them. I've used them hundreds of times.
We should stop producing most disposable plastic bags. Oil is too valuable to make into shitty plastic bags just so someone can use them to carry groceries from the store to the car and then the car to the house. Even if the bags actually made it to the landfill and didn't wind up in the ocean, it would still be a waste. Since they do end up in the ocean, it's even worse.
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I live in a no-disposable-plastic-bag city, and most people pay $1/ea for heavy duty plastic bags. Some I've used hundreds of times, and they're only showing minor wear. None have failed on me, ever.
I do also have a couple cotton ones, in case I want to carry it in a jacket pocket. Luxury.
People against this policy don't realize that they're fighting against having higher quality bags when shopping. They're fighting against luxury, to defend the practice of putting one or two items in a cheap plastic bag.
Ev
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I live in a no-disposable-bag state. And so far, I can count a single-digit number of times that I saw someone who brought his or her own bag. Single-digit. But I see people buying new reusable bags approximately every trip I take to any store. I'm sure there are a few people like you. But there are a lot m
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Oh, and while most shops do sell thicker plastic bags that you can trade in for a replacement when they wear out, most people here carry their shopping in something a bit more sturdy (fabric, canvas or high
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You can use them again as, say, trash bags, or to hold your dirty shoes when you travel, etc.
Why is the left is so myopic and un-creative?
Single use?! No wonder leftists are always in debt!
Because you do this with every one of your disposable bags. Sure.
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You can use them again as, say, trash bags, or to hold your dirty shoes when you travel, etc.
Why is the left is so myopic and un-creative?
Single use?! No wonder leftists are always in debt!
Yeah, you can reuse the ones that don't tear apart on your way home from the supermarket, which is like 50% of them...
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I will say one thing about plastic bags: you can carry far more groceries in plastic bags than in paper bags. That means fewer trips from the car into the house and saves me time and effort. I could live without plastic bags, but they are darned convenient.