Trash usage pricing is coming

If you are a commercial customer, it is here. Commercial customers pay per ton or per yard already. In some towns there is also a per amount fee for consumers. My town requires a fee sticker per bag/barrel. Recycling is motivated by being free (actually subsidized by the bag fee). Hazardous waste and other restrictions also apply (e.g., appliances must be taken to the recycling center). This change will spread gradually. There is a transaction cost to be absorbed, and the actual local disposal costs may not justify it.

Recycling has been increasing steadily over the years. Metals recycling is very well established. By percentage it is nearing 50% for iron, and is well above that for copper and aluminum. Paper has been climbing one or two percent per year, and is currently at about 50%. Plastic is much lower, rarely 2 uses before burn/landfill, because it is technologically much harder to recycle plastics. Those are total US consumption vs recycling numbers. As usual, the industrial and commercial sectors are way ahead of the consumers. Talk is cheap and popular with consumers. Action is easier for commercial organizations. They have the larger volume, the cost accountants to compute the savings, and the engineers to make the changes.

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