Straight Dope Message Board

[Mdcastle]

Originally Posted by Voyager

The reason for the mandatory charge is to cover the case where people forget to bring bags, or choose not to. Would you prefer that no bags at all are available?
And the behavior being controlled is littering.

No, if the problem is litter with plastic bags I want to be able to get paper bags for free like I always have.

If the governments trying to force me to use reusable bags I want them to mind their own damn business and not try to reverse all the progress we've made in society. 51

[nelliebly]

The city where I live banned plastic bags several years ago. Stores offer paper bags for 5¢ per big bag. I used to forget to bring my own bags in from the car every time I went to the supermarket. Cured that by making myself leave my cart and walk back to the car to get them. Now I don't drive, and I never forget my cloth bags: when you walk over a mile each way to the supermarket, you want something sturdier than paper to carry your groceries.

I used to reuse the plastic bags for little trash can liners. Now I buy them and feel guilty about it. 52

[fedman]

Originally Posted by Voyager

Here is info on the drop in California.


I have had no trouble remembering to bring bags to the grocery store. I keep a few in my car, just in case. The conference I'm involved with gave them out, and I got extra being on the committee. I can guarantee they were very cheap, but they've lasted at least five years with no signs of wearing out.
Unless you work for a plastic bag company, I just don't understand being against a ban.

Cleveland is considering banning one use plastic bags , preferring paper bags or reusable plastic. Of course with paper bags:
if you have one with handle, too much weight, the handle will break
if you have paper bag without handles, you have to carry it in your arms, which is not only tiring but also limits the amount of shopping you can do (I'm referring to shoppers without cars), and definitely don't get bag wet!
With single use plastic bags , I can carry more groceries (4+) which also have more tensile strength

to be fair Cleveland has several exemptions each violation(person sold bag starts at $50), but I can't figure out if you can't buy plastic bags, how can you use them for doggie dumps, etc 53

[BigT]

It seems there is an obvious solution to the "forgot it at home" issue. Just have cheap, reusable bags available that you have to purchase. You'll feel bad for having to purchase it, so you'll be more likely to remember, but you won't have to go without if you forgot.

However, I do think it would be harder if you lived in those cities where you walk all the time instead of drive. It's easy to leave the bags in your car. (We already do that with the bags designed to keep things cold.) But to always have them on your person would be weird. Sure, you probably don't need as many if you are within walking distance, but you still probably just leave them at home.

So there would be times when you would be able to walk right over to the store on your way back home, and instead have to go home and get your bags. That kinds sucks. Though, if you live in those walkable places, you probably have more money than most of us, and thus wouldn't mind paying a bit for a new bag. 54

[BigT]

Oh, the OP did finally answer my question of why we don't just go back to paper bags. The carbon footprint issue is probably even more pressing than the plastic pollution issue right now. 55

[Filbert]

Originally Posted by puzzlegal

That shocks me. I doubt that one single straw I have ever used ended up in the ocean. I can't even think how that would happen. It's not as if the wind picks them up and blows them away.

Half the local economy seems to be based on beachside cafes round here, combined with strong winds and steep hillsides, pretty well anything dropped tends to wind up in the sea. Look at somewhere like this and it's easy to see how it happens, and this place gets busy in season.

I suspect it's largely because they stay so easily recognisable that they get the direct attention, but as a small item often handed to a kid they do get everywhere. 56

[Mundane Super Hero]

Am I the only one who has already started hoarding? I have 5 plastic bags filled with about 30 plastic bags each just in case of emergencies... 57

[puzzlegal]

Originally Posted by Filbert

Half the local economy seems to be based on beachside cafes round here, combined with strong winds and steep hillsides, pretty well anything dropped tends to wind up in the sea. Look at somewhere like this and it's easy to see how it happens, and this place gets busy in season.

I suspect it's largely because they stay so easily recognisable that they get the direct attention, but as a small item often handed to a kid they do get everywhere.

Okay, maybe it makes sense to ban plastic straws for outdoor beach-side restaurants.

Originally Posted by Mundane Super Hero

Am I the only one who has already started hoarding? I have 5 plastic bags filled with about 30 plastic bags each just in case of emergencies...

Nope. Plastic bags are too useful to go away, I expect I will continue to be able to buy them. (And it's not the cheap supermarket bags I am missing -- I can buy things like that -- it's the nice, heavy-weight ones that places like nice bookstores or fancy food emporia used to give out that I am really missing. They make nice gym bags, lunch bags, etc.)

But I have invested in a lot of plastic straws. It's one of those things that many people don't care about much, so even if the only motivation is "it gives you warm fuzzies to deny me a straw", I'm afraid we'll get meaningful straw bans. I got the little ones that are rated to use in hot coffee, since that's when I care about them the most. 58

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by fedman

Cleveland is considering banning one use plastic bags , preferring paper bags or reusable plastic. Of course with paper bags:
if you have one with handle, too much weight, the handle will break
if you have paper bag without handles, you have to carry it in your arms, which is not only tiring but also limits the amount of shopping you can do (I'm referring to shoppers without cars), and definitely don't get bag wet!
With single use plastic bags , I can carry more groceries (4+) which also have more tensile strength

to be fair Cleveland has several exemptions each violation(person sold bag starts at $50), but I can't figure out if you can't buy plastic bags, how can you use them for doggie dumps, etc

But your kids can't make textbook covers with plastic bags, can they? (My number one use for paper bags when I was in school, but no plastic bags back then.)
I think the goal is not to transition to paper but to transition to bring your own cloth bags, which are a win both for carbon footprint and pollution.

As for dog poop, we used the vegetable bags which are still allowed and bags that our newspaper came in during rainy season. I never much liked using the grocery store bag for dog poop anyhow. We have a plastic bag dispenser for dog bags which let you stuff bags in at the top and take them out the bottom. No dog now but we keep it filled for when we dog sit. 59

[fedman]

Originally Posted by mhendo

I can understand forgetting the first few times after the plastic bag ban went into effect, but after that, you're just not trying.

We keep a half-dozen bags in the trunk of our car. When we shop and bring the bags into the house, we empty the bags and then hang them on the front door handle. Then, the next time someone walks out the front door to go to the car, they grab the bags off the door handle and put them back in the car.

This is not especially difficult.

what about people without cars? 60

[purplehorseshoe]

I have a bunch of canvas bags, and prefer using those since it's more comfortable to carry heavy groceries in with those.

However, in the last couple of years, I've had to re-train myself back to leaving them in my car. Between the litter box, the dog walks, the bathroom bins, etc. I found myself unable to maintain even a modest cache of plastic bags to hoard in case of zombie apocalypse, or a local bag ban.

I now let the clerk bag my stuff into plastic bags for me, then load everything, bags and all, into my sacks once I'm at my car. My inner environmentalist hippie earth mother goddess gasped the first time I did this ... until I reminded that bitch that we were utterly and completely OUT of cat poop bags at home. That's right, none left. That shut her up.

I'm a cheap bastard and hate paying for something I can get for free, so buying small plastic bags irks me. I'll spring for the tough, sturdy trash bags for the big kitchen bin. But cat poop? I'll be damned if I'm buying bags for that, just to immediately throw them away. Gimme my free plastic bag at the grocery store - we still need a disposable way to transport raw chicken anyway, for sanitation sake - and there are so very few freebies in life. 61

[running coach]

Originally Posted by fedman

what about people without cars?

They have to plan ahead. Or always have a bag or two in the purse/manbag/computer bag/etc.

I only have my handcycle and I use a trailer for errands. The bags live in the trailer so there's no remembering needed. 62

[puzzlegal]

Originally Posted by fedman

what about people without cars?

I keep a sturdy plastic bag in my purse or pocket. I don't want to carry tons of stuff while I'm walking, but it's good to have a container for little/light things. Rolled up, it doesn't take much space. Some people go more minimalist and carry a string bag, which collapses to almost nothing. 63

[RTFirefly]

Originally Posted by puzzlegal

And it's not the cheap supermarket bags I am missing -- I can buy things like that -- it's the nice, heavy-weight ones that places like nice bookstores or fancy food emporia used to give out that I am really missing. They make nice gym bags, lunch bags, etc.

I know the ones you mean. We always have a pile of them sitting around in a closet or somewhere that we hate to throw away. I should cram a bunch of them into a small box and mail them to you. 64

[puzzlegal]

Originally Posted by RTFirefly

I know the ones you mean. We always have a pile of them sitting around in a closet or somewhere that we hate to throw away. I should cram a bunch of them into a small box and mail them to you.

I recently found one from the 80's tucked away in my closet. I've been using it to carry my lunch. 65

[Corry El]

Originally Posted by WildaBeast

I'm having trouble understanding how they figure that. If I cancel the trip to Greece I booked for this summer American Airlines isn't going to cancel that flight. They're more than likely going to sell that seat to someone else. The plane is still going to fly that route and burn just as much fuel, I just won't be on it. Worst case (from the airline's perspective), they don't manage to sell that seat to another passenger and the plane leaves with an empty seat. But the effect of having one fewer passenger on the plane's fuel burn is pretty much negligible.

Is the idea that if lots of people all decide to travel less, airlines will respond to the decrease in demand be scheduling fewer flights?

If you make the assumption it's just you changing behavior, you can always dismiss carbon reducing behavior as trivial. All the more if you make the further assumption that 'they'd just sell it to somebody else', 'the same plane just departs with one less person', etc. I'm not sure that's very logically compelling though. Everyone sensible realizes that behavior changes would only matter if it's lots of people. But activists and educators try to convince...lots of people to change their behavior.

Although *practically* I don't believe voluntary individual behavior changes are likely to make a profound difference in world carbon emissions. And I don't believe collective policies will either, if based on forcing people to lower their standard of living. Much cheaper ways will have to be found to reduce emissions at a given living standard, and/or ways to directly engineer the climate or remove CO2 from the air economically, and/or adaptation, or everyone is screwed. Huge carbon reductions at today's tech aren't going to happen IMO. It's shown again and again people won't vote for that once and if it's demonstrated it cost a lot in terms of living standards*, and even dictatorships like in China have to keep people's rising economic expectations satisfied. If it didn't cost a lot it would easily happen. It's not easily happening from which the straightforward inference is that it's costly, despite the gambit of some proponents of radical carbon reductions pretending it's not or that 'somebody else' will pay.

All that said AIUI anti-plastic is mainly about litter and ocean waste in particular, not carbon so much. Our municipality in the US now has a law requiring merchants to charge for $0.10 per plastic bag. I must say it has reduced our use, it just rankles to have to pay even that small amount so we generally bring the reusable bags or just carry small purchases in hand. It's pretty unusual now for us to forget the reusable and buy too many things to carry bagless.

*broadly speaking, as in your example. Are rich world people let alone people in up and coming countries like China going to travel the world a lot less because it emits a lot of carbon? I just don't see that happening. Airplane makers might reduce emissions per seat-mile by 10's of %...but there's a few billion people in countries where only a relatively small elite have been able to fly, but now transitioning or headed toward the standard of living where most people can afford to fly. Same with cars on an even bigger scale. It will swamp what one *country* can do, let alone one *person*. 66

[Mdcastle]

Originally Posted by Corry El

Although *practically* I don't believe voluntary individual behavior changes are likely to make a profound difference in world carbon emissions. And I don't believe collective policies will either, if based on forcing people to lower their standard of living. Much cheaper ways will have to be found to reduce emissions at a given living standard, and/or ways to directly engineer the climate or remove CO2 from the air economically, and/or adaptation, or everyone is screwed. Huge carbon reductions at today's tech aren't going to happen IMO. It's shown again and again people won't vote for that once and if it's demonstrated it cost a lot in terms of living standards*, and even dictatorships like in China have to keep people's rising economic expectations satisfied. If it didn't cost a lot it would easily happen. It's not easily happening from which the straightforward inference is that it's costly, despite the gambit of some proponents of radical carbon reductions pretending it's not or that 'somebody else' will pay.

Agreed. Environmentalists seem not to understand that Americans aren't going to voluntarily subject themselves to the standard of living of say Burkina Faso. We don't want to give up the freedom cars bring us, the space and privacy detached houses bring us, or the nice juicy flavor of hamburgers made from farting cows. Then you have AOC trying to attach them a bunch of socialist wealth redistribution programs that just alienate a lot of people while having zero to do with climate change. 67

[KMS94]

Originally Posted by Voyager

But your kids can't make textbook covers with plastic bags, can they? (My number one use for paper bags when I was in school, but no plastic bags back then.)

When the beginning of school came around, our local grocery store always switched over to paper bags that came with book cover templates printed on them with things like Name:_______, Subject:__________, and such. Late seventies through the eighties, at least. They may still do, but I can't remember the last time I got a paper bag from the grocery store.

My Dad was a civil engineer, and had a drafting table at home. After the first day of school, he would stay up waaay past my bedtime, toiling away on the drafting table. In the morning, all the books would be covered for the second day of school. His meticulously made, perfectly folded and taped book covers, boldly labeled in black magic marker in that all-capital, technical lettering engineers and architects use made me the proudest kid in class. 68

[ChockFullOfHeadyGoodness]

Originally Posted by KMS94

His meticulously made, perfectly folded and taped book covers, boldly labeled in black magic marker in that all-capital, technical lettering engineers and architects use made me the proudest kid in class.

I think I had the coolest book covers in my entire high school. The local retrospective cinema (the long-gone Cove Twin Theatre in Hermosa Beach) distributed a free calendar of the next 2 months worth of upcoming films. It was on sturdy stock, about 11x17, and each date square had a mini poster of the upcoming single or double feature. Most films played a day or two, so the calendar had mini posters for 30-40 movies. It was the perfect size to fold over a text book.

One month a new calendar came out, so I replaced the cover on my geography book. One of the films they were showing that month was "Barbarella". The teacher glanced at my book cover, and then flew off the handle and went into a 5 minute rant about Jane Fonda and Hanoi and she was a treasonous traitor who should never have been allowed back into the country and on and on and on. It was a trip to watch this normally mild-mannered close-to-retirement guy go into a frothing rage, and more of a trip to know that I indirectly caused it. 69

[Voyager]

Originally Posted by ChockFullOfHeadyGoodness

I think I had the coolest book covers in my entire high school. The local retrospective cinema (the long-gone Cove Twin Theatre in Hermosa Beach) distributed a free calendar of the next 2 months worth of upcoming films. It was on sturdy stock, about 11x17, and each date square had a mini poster of the upcoming single or double feature. Most films played a day or two, so the calendar had mini posters for 30-40 movies. It was the perfect size to fold over a text book.

One month a new calendar came out, so I replaced the cover on my geography book. One of the films they were showing that month was "Barbarella". The teacher glanced at my book cover, and then flew off the handle and went into a 5 minute rant about Jane Fonda and Hanoi and she was a treasonous traitor who should never have been allowed back into the country and on and on and on. It was a trip to watch this normally mild-mannered close-to-retirement guy go into a frothing rage, and more of a trip to know that I indirectly caused it.

That sounds like one cool cover. But judging from the Barbarella posters I've seen, I find it amusing that the only thing your teacher objected to was Jane's politics.

I had to cut and fold my own covers, and know how this prepared me for life?
Not a damned bit. 70

[Capn Carl]

Originally Posted by Mdcastle

Agreed. Environmentalists seem not to understand that Americans aren't going to voluntarily subject themselves to the standard of living of say Burkina Faso. We don't want to give up the freedom cars bring us, the space and privacy detached houses bring us, or the nice juicy flavor of hamburgers made from farting cows. Then you have AOC trying to attach them a bunch of socialist wealth redistribution programs that just alienate a lot of people while having zero to do with climate change.

I agree that many Americans feel entitled to big cars, detached homes, hamburgers, and cheap plastic bags, but the trend seems to be moving toward ride sharing, apartments, veggie burgers, and reusable bags. 71

[Nava]

And there is quite a bit of range between the standards of the US and Burkina Faso, as well as different standards within the US. 72